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OUR BEAUTIFUL NORTHLAND 
OF OPPORTUNITY 



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ALASKA 

OUR BEAUTIFUL NORTHLAND 
OF OPPORTUNITY 



A Description of Its Rivers, Mountains, Glaciers, Volcanoes, 
and Other Beautiful and Unusual Scenic Features and of the 
Rare Delights It Offers Travellers, Big Game Hunters, Moun- 
tain Climbers, Explorers ; Its Towns cuid Pioneer Settlements ; 
The Government Railroad and Mount McKinley National 
Park; Its Rich Resources; Its Openings for New Business 
ELnterprises ; Its Indians, Their Primitive Customs and Pres- 
ent Development ; Its Romantic Early History When Rus- 
sian, Spanish, and Other Nations Sought Its Wealth; the 
Gold Rush Days; Its Present Progress and Bright Future 

BY 

AGNES RUSH BURR 



Willi a map ami fifty-four plates 
of which six are in color 




THE PAGE COMPANY 
BOSTON « MDCCCCXIX 



Jf'?' 



C'? 



Copyright, igig, by 
The Page Company 



All rights reserved 



First Impression, June, 1919 



.5^ 



JUL -3 i^iB 



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©r,U530074 



o 



DEDICATED 

TO 

THE MEN AND WOMEN 

WHO KNOW AND LOVE THE NORTH 



PREFACE 



In offering this volume to the American people, the 
desire has been to bring to them an adequate picture, so 
far as is possible, of the great treasure house that is theirs 
on the northwest corner of the continent. 

Alaska is a land of beautiful scenery and of almost 
inexhaustible resources. It is a land with a romantic 
history, and a land of interesting people, whether these 
be the sturdy pioneers and their descendants with their 
tales of early days, the Indians, and the rapid progress 
they are making on their march toward civilization, or 
the prospector with pack on back on his tireless quest 
for gold. 

It is a land also of many opportunities. In size about 
one-fifth of the whole United States, in resources almost 
equal in variety to those of the entire country, Alaska 
as yet has but comparatively a small population and few 
industries. New business enterprises in almost count- 
less number await the seeing eye and earnest hand of the 
shrewd business man and woman. 

Alaska can be reached by modern, well-appointed 
steamers over a route that has few equals in the coun- 
try or abroad for beauty of scenery. It can be travelled 
through by rail and other equally well-appointed boats. 
There is even a three-hundred-mile motor trip that can 
be taken in the heart of the country through majestic 
scenery not to be matched elsewhere on a motor highway 
in the world. There is no discomfort in travellinsr in 
Alaska and there is always natural beauty of a high order 
and, in many places, a touch with the primeval that is 
novel and fascinating. Alaska has been called "Our last 



Vlll 



Preface 



frontier," yet it is a frontier that can be viewed from 
steamer decks, observation cars and automobiles. 

These facts it has been the desire to set forth in detail 
that the people of our country may realize and appreciate 
to the full all that Alaska has to give them. It is a great, 
enjoyable, health-giving playground. It is a rich store- 
house of many things we need in the business world and 
in the home. It is a field to which we can turn with 
bright faces for new opportunities to work, and in the 
development of these opportunities develop afresh that 
hardihood, resourcefulness and initiative that have made 
the American people what they are to-day. 

In gathering the material to present these facts, grate- 
ful acknowledgment is due the many who have so kindly 
and generously helped with information, with illustrative 
material, with aid in getting into sections otherwise inac- 
cessible. Among these are many government officials 
both at Washington and in Alaska, some of them being 
Secretary Franklin K. Lane, of the Department of the 
Interior, Mr. E. C Bradley, Assistant to the Secretary 
of the Interior, Mr. Thomas Riggs, Jr., Governor of 
Alaska; also Mrs. E. H. Harriman, who kindly furnished 
photographs of regions not penetrated yet by the profes- 
sional photographer; Dr. Leonard S. Sugden, the well- 
known lecturer, whose many years of residence in Alaska, 
especially during the early years of its development, make 
him not only an authority on Alaskan matters but furnish 
the eye-witness viewpoint that is so interesting and val- 
uable; Mr. J. L. McPherson, of the Alaska Bureau of the 
Seattle Chamber of Commerce, who has made the study 
of Alaska almost his life work; Mr. Kenneth Kerr of 
the Seattle "Railway and Marine News," and many 
others. 

Agnes Rush Burr. 



CONTENTS 



Preface vii 

I Alaska at a Glance i 

II From Seattle NoRTirv\'ARD 15 

III Into American Waters 30 

IV Wrangell to Skagway 43 

V Skagway and the White Pass 55 

VI Beautiful Lake Atun 72 

VII On to Dawson 84 

VIII The Dawson of To-day loi 

IX The Dawson of Yesterday iii 

X Dawson to Fairbanks 129 

XI Fairbanks, the Golden Heart of Alaska . . 144 

XII Motoring Three Hundred Miles ln the Heart 

OF Alaska 155 

XIII To THE Westward 16S 

XIV From Fairbanks to Nome via the Yukon . .185 
XV Little-Known Regions of Alasbla 206 

XVI Sitka and Alaska's History 218 

X\TI Alaska's RoMAhmc History 228 

XVIII Forests and Flo\\'ers 249 

XIX The Wild Animal Life 357 

XX The Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 268 

XXI Alaska's Fishing Industries 293 

XXII Furs in Richness and Variety 308 

XXIII The Agricultural Possibilities of the Territory 320 

XXIV Transportation Problems 333 

XXV The Natives and Their Education 360 

XXVI Life in Alaska 383 



X Contents 



CHAPTER 



PAGE 



XXVII Business Opportunities That Alaska Offers . 390 
XXVIII The Present Complicated Government , . . .401 

Bibliography 421 

Index • 423 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



-♦ 

PAGE 



Lover's Lane, Indian Park, Sitka {In full color). (See 

page 226) Frontispiece 

MAP OF ALASKA i 

A View of the Inside Passage 5 

Victoria, from the House of Parliament . . .19 

Indians in Their Potlatch Costumes 24 

Ketchikan 38 

Wrangell 40 

Wrangell Narrows (In full color) 44 

Juneau 49 

Icebergs in Taku Inlet {In full color) . . . .52 

Skagway and Lynn Canal 56 

The Steel Cantilever Bridge on the White Pass Route 67 

Lake Atlin 74 

Llewellyn Glacier 82 

White Horse Rapids 86 

The Yukon Dogs 92 

Main Street, Dawson 102 

A Bird's-eye View of Dawson 106 

A Pack Train of Early Days 116 

A Street Scene in Dawson in the Early Days . .120 
A New Camp after a Gold Discovery . . . .122 

"Wooding Up" 132 

The Midnight Sun 135 

Fairbanks 146 

"Occasionally a Little Lake Appears" {In full color) . 158 

Childs Glacier 167 

Columbia Glacier 171 

Dutch Harbor 182 



xu 



List of Illustrations 



A Typical Yukon Settlement 

A Street Scene, Nome 

Mlning on Tundra, near Nome 

A Street Scene, Sitka 

"Madonna and Child," in the Greek Church, Sitka 
The Scenic Beauty the Early Explorers Discovered 

Resurrection Bay 

Wild Flowers (In full color) .... 

Spruce Trees, Sitka 

A Herd of Caribou ..... 

A KoDiAK Bear ...... 

Panning for Gold ..... 

Hydraulicking 

Copper at Cordova, Ready to be Shipped 

A Marble Quarry 

An Acre of Herring 

A Day's Catch of Walrus .... 
Seals on Pribilof Islands .... 

A Fox Farm 

Field of Grain on the Government Experimental Farm at 

Fairbanks 

"Mush on, You Huskies" .... 
Building the Government Railroad . 
A Bird's-eye View of Seward 

Mt. McKinley 

A Native Alaskan Indian .... 
An Alaskan Sunset (Fn full color) . . 
The Meeting of the Old and the New . 



PAGE 
190 

198 
220 
222 

240 
250 

255 
258 
260 
270 
272 
278 
285 
294 
304 
312 
316 

327 

339 
345 
350 
363 
384 
412 



ALASKA 



OUR BEAUTIFUL NORTHLAND 
OF OPPORTUNITY 



CHAPTER I 
alaska at a glance 

What Muir, Burroughs, Henry Gannett, and others have 
to say of its scenery. russia making history on the 
western coast when the colonies were struggling for 

INDEPENDENCE. ThE TIDE OF WEALTH THAT POURS FROM 

Alaska. Facts about Alaska geographically that sur- 
prise THOSE unfamiliar WITH THE COUNTRY. 

William H. Seward, Governor, United States 
Senator, and Secretary of State during Lincoln's and 
Johnson's administrations, was once asked what he con- 
sidered the most important act of his pubhc career. 

" The purchase of Alaska," was the prompt reply. 
" But it will take the people a generation to find it out." 

It has taken them longer than that. Even yet to 
many the name brings visions of a region remote, inac- 
cessible, associated in thought with the Arctic Ocean, 
Bering Sea, and the Arctic Circle, and, therefore, cold, 
desolate and uninhabitable. This understanding of 
Alaska is due largely to the pictures and stories first 
circulated about it of Eskimos, fur clothing, dog sleds, 
icebergs, snow mountains, and glaciers. When the gold 
rush of '98 focussed the eyes of the world upon it for a 

1 



2 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

time, the tales of hardship brought by those who re- 
turned only served to strengthen this belief in its 
inaccessibility and desolation. Thus in the general 
thought it still remains a place to be reached only with 
difficulty and discomfort, and of little interest or value. 
An illustration of this widespread misapprehension was 
given only a year ago by a well-known Eastern firm of 
map makers who wrote to a customer at Sitka that they 
could not ship his order before navigation closed there 
for the winter and so would hold it until spring. 

For those who thus regard Alaska, there are in store 
many delightful surprises; for when they come to know 
the country as it is, they will find it a land of magnificent 
scenery, romantic history, primitive people of unusual 
interest, and with a population that wins admiration for 
the hardihood and initiative it has shown. For those 
who look for more practical things, the country has re- 
sources that astound by their richness, and opportunities 
for new industries so great they can scarcely be visioned. 

Its scenery is unequalled in the known regions of the 
world. Addison Powell, a member of several United 
States' Geological surveying parties, says, " The scenery 
of Alaska is finer than Switzerland, the Austrian Tyrol, 
Venice, Vesuvius, and the Bay of Naples." Varied as 
this category is, Alaska can fulfill its requirements, for in 
different parts of the country can be found beauty that 
answers to all these descriptions. Its snow peaks and 
glaciers far surpass those of Switzerland. Sitka has been 
likened by many to Venice. Mt. Katmai far outrivals 
Vesuvius. The coloring and contour of the many har- 
bors that indent the coast surpass in beauty the Bay of 
Naples. In making these comparisons there is no thought 
of boastfulness or the mere flaunting of superiority. 
Every part of this beautiful world has its individual 



Alaska at a Glance 



charm. But certain places have long been accepted as 
standards in the matter of scenic beauty. Alaska is 
compared with these that the unfamiliar may take form 
through the familiar. 

The late Henry Gannett, President of the Geographical 
Society and a member of the Harriman Expedition, that 
interesting party of scientists, writers, artists and explor- 
ers, who, at the invitation of Mr. E. H. Harriman, spent 
the better part of a summer on his private yacht cruising 
in Alaskan waters for the purpose of studying the physi- 
cal characteristics of the country, says of its scenery: 
" There are glaciers, mountains, and fiords elsewhere, but 
nowhere else on earth is there such an abundance and 
magnificence of mountain, fiord and glacier scenery. For 
thousands of miles the coast is a continual panorama. For 
the one Yosemite of California, Alaska has hundreds. 
The mountains and glaciers of the Cascade Range are 
duplicated a thousand-fold. The Alaska coast is to be- 
come the show place of the earth, and pilgrims from far 
beyond the United States will throng in endless procession 
to see it." And in conclusion he says, " There is one word 
of advice and caution to be given those intending to visit 
Alaska for pleasure, for sightseeing. If you are old, go 
by all means; but if you are young, wait. The scenery 
of Alaska is much grander than anything else of the kind 
in the world, and it is not well to dull one's capacity for 
enjoyment by seeing the finest first." 

John Burroughs, who was also of this party, says, 
" Probably the finest scenery of the kind in the world that 
can be seen from the deck of a ship." John Muir, the 
great nature lover and glacial authority, who was like- 
wise a member of the expedition, writes, " To the lover 
of pure wildness, Alaska is one of the most wonderful 
countries in the world." 



4 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

All such praise seems exaggeration to those who do not 
know Alaska, but to those who have been privileged to 
see its beauty, such words are but simple truth. " The 
truth about Alaska is good enough," writes General Rich- 
ardson of the government service in one of his reports. 
It is not only good enough, but it is so remarkably good 
that few believe it. They put it down as exaggeration. 
But some day, as Mr. Gannett says, the Alaskan coast 
will be the mecca for lovers of natural beauty the world 
over, and Alaska will be appreciated and enjoyed at its 
worth. 

The spectacular features of Alaskan scenery are usually 
most dwelt upon, — Mt. McKinley, towering twenty thou- 
sand, three hundred feet in the air, the highest peak on the 
North American continent ; the Malaspina glacier, cover- 
ing one thousand, five hundred square miles, one-tenth of 
the whole area of Switzerland and greater than the area 
of Rhode Island, and with an ice wall on the ocean front 
estimated variously at from fifty to one hundred miles in 
length; the Yukon River, rising within a score or so of 
miles of tidewater, yet flowing more than two thousand 
miles to reach the ocean; weird, dim days when the sun 
scarcely peeps above the horizon, and gloriously bright, 
twenty-four-hour long days when it does not set; the 
aurora flashing its brilliant streamers across the midnight 
sky, " the lights when the spirits dance," say the Indians, 
and the strange, pallid mock suns that seem to be trying to 
make up in number what they lack in light. 

All these are part of the marvelous and novel beauty 
that Alaska gives, but they are not the whole of the scenic 
offerings. From almost the time one starts Alaskaward, 
there is a succession of snow-capped mountains, a suc- 
cession of glaciers. It is no unusual thing to count 
within the glance of the eye, as the steamer glides along 



Alaska at a Glance 



the coast or through the channels of the Inside Passage, a 
dozen of these great ice rivers pouring down from the 
sky. There are waterfalls innumerable, lacing mountain- 
sides with slender lines of silvery loveliness amidst the 
deep green of spruce, or leaping in great foaming torrents 
from craggy mountain brows to glistening gray boulders, 
and filling the air with the thunder of their voice and the 
radiant glory of their rainbows. There are silent fiords 
lying placid under gray mountain walls; deep, dark can- 
yons through which rivers boil over rocks and rapids. 
There are great stretches of pleasant valleys filled with 
grasses and slender, arrow-tipped spruce. And every- 
where are wild flowers, — on the ruggedest mountains, 
mosses with delicate, tiny blossoms, growing to the very 
feet of the glaciers, even at times on the glaciers them- 
selves, seeming to draw substance from moisture and air 
alone; in the woods and valleys and along the shores, 
single blossoms and scattered groups and veritable sheets 
of blue lupines, wild pink peas, rosy fireweed, bluebells, 
gold and white daisies, heavenly blue larkspur, and wild 
roses of a size and fragrance unknown elsewhere. Seem- 
ingly every blossom that nature has made grows here in a 
profusion that covers the landscape with color and fills 
the air with fragrance. 

Had Alaska nothing to offer but its scenery, it still 
would have a worthy treasure to give. But it has much 
else. 

To many Americans, its history is as unfamiliar as the 
features of its landscape. In fact it is thought by many 
to have no history other than that of its Indians and the 
annals of the argonauts that flocked thither upon the dis- 
covery of gold. But when the colonies on the eastern 
coast were struggling for independence, and later wres- 
tling with the first problems of a new form of crovernrnent, 



6 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Alaska had its shipbuilding plants, its foundries, its farms 
and cattle. In the early days of the last century, there 
were balls and banquets at Sitka that rivalled in richness 
of appointment and beauty of apparel the social gayeties 
on the Atlantic seaboard. The Russian is a lover of color 
and of brilliant display and the ceremonious festivities at 
Sitka were marked with the flashing of jewels, the rustle 
of silks, the soft richness of velvet and the sparkle of 
wine. Russian feet danced to Russian music on this 
northwest coast when gay belles were threading the mazes 
of the minuet on the shores of the distant Atlantic. Alas- 
ka's early history is a story of exploration, colonization, 
and industrial activity no less interesting than that of 
other parts of the country and quite as distinctive. On 
the eastern coast were Spanish, English and Dutch col- 
onies with their characteristic life. Here on the west was 
another offshoot of the Old World with a life as novel, 
and which, until as late as 1867, was maintained in all its 
picturesqueness. 

The native life of Alaska also has its interest. The 
Indians of the Territory are not dependent upon Uncle 
Sam as are those of the States. They do not live upon 
reservations. The government provides native schools, 
and helps in every way possible to the natives' best devel- 
opment, but the Indians are self supporting. They have 
quickly adapted themselves to the changes which the 
opening of the Territory has brought. They have their 
cooperative stores, their canneries and sawmills, their 
power launches, their neat, pretty homes. Even far away 
north toward the Arctic, the Eskimos have electric lights, 
and publish a magazine of their own devoted to the inter- 
ests of their race. 

The settlers of Alaska are a people to arouse admira- 
tion. They have fought against great odds and con- 



Alaska at a Glance 



quered. With packs on their backs, containing all the 
supplies they possessed, they made their way in the begin- 
ning over rugged mountain ranges and torrential streams. 
They struggled through marsh and tundra, sinking to 
shoe tops, to knees, to waist. In the winter, they wrestled 
with blizzards and long, sunless days. They had to de- 
pend entirely upon their own resources for subsistence 
and upon their own indomitable will for success. Disap- 
pointment after disappointment did not dishearten them. 
If one valley did not yield the treasure they were seeking, 
they went to another. Even after little settlements began 
to come, they still had much with which to contend. 
There were almost no transportation facilities in the usual 
meaning of the word, and the wilderness had to be daily 
conquered. It is this race of hardy, unconquerable 
pioneers and their descendants that people Alaska to-day. 
It is their resourcefulness, initiative, and indomitable will 
that is making the Territory forge ahead as rapidly as it 
is. 

But though these are features to fire the imagination 
and make us realize, as perhaps we have not, the interest 
that lies for us in this great territory to the northwest, 
Alaska has a side that will make to the practical an even 
stronger appeal. It has resources that amaze. Of its 
gold, all have heard, though perhaps many do not realize 
the tremendousness of its output. The Treadwell group 
of mines alone have produced $63,000,000. Over against 
this it is well to recall that only $7,200,000 was paid for 
the whole of the Territory. But gold is only one of 
Alaska's productions, and though great as has been the 
output, indications begin to point to other resources that 
will soon outrank it. 

But, so far, it occupies first place, and up to 1917 the 
total production amounted to more than $293,000,000. 



8 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Including 1918, it will easily go over $300,000,000. 

Copper is perhaps the next richest mineral product. 
The mines of Alaska are the richest in the world, and the 
Kennicott Mine ranks fourth in the world's production 
and first in the low cost of operating. Since the purchase, 
Alaska's output of copper up to 1917 is more than 
$91,000,000. Including 1918, this output will reach 
$110,000,000. 

These two are considered the leading minerals. Yet 
the earth is rich in many others. Coal, silver, lead, tin, 
iron, antimony, tungsten, graphite, cinnabar, platinum, 
molybdenum, marble, gypsum, used for plaster of Paris 
and fertilizer, barytes, of value in the manufacture of 
white lead, all are here, many in seemingly inexhaustible 
quantity. There are ledges of coal, in many places in 
plain view, many feet thick and extending for miles. On 
some parts of the coast and in some places in the interior, 
coal is washed up in plentiful quantity. Prospectors, 
miners, and residents pick up what they need as they 
need it. It is said that Alaska has more coal than Penn- 
sylvania. The coal story of the Territory has not yet 
even its alphabet. 

Alaska marble includes not only the ordinary black 
and white variety but several other kinds in which are the 
most delicate and lovely tintings of lavender, green, pale 
gold and other colorings, that lend themselves to exquisite 
furnishing effects. In quality it equals the most famous 
of Vermont's products, and it is being used almost exclu- 
sively in the construction of buildings on the western 
coast. 

Chrome ore, used in the making of steel, has recently 
been discovered. Antimony, mined first in 1915, has 
already produced $253,000, and tungsten, worked first 
in 1916, has yielded more than $83,000. 



Alaska at a Glance 9 

■ «''■' ■■' ■ ■ ■.■■ 

The better known minerals such as silver, lead, tin. 
graphite and others are yielding steadily. There is said 
to be more tin in Alaska than in the British mines. 

Yet in all these the ground has, as it is said, scarcely 
been scratched. Many of the vast mineral deposits of 
the interior are not worked at all owing to the present 
high cost of transportation which makes the getting in 
of supplies and machinery prohibitive. When this is 
overcome and the mineral wealth of Alaska begins to 
pour out in the flood of which these small beginnings show 
it is capable, it will astound the world. 

Minerals seem naturally the wealth first thought of in 
connection with Alaska, perhaps because of the impres- 
sion produced by its gold discoveries. But it has other 
resources equally valuable. 

Running close to the value of its mineral output is the 
value of its fisheries. And if its mineral production is 
still in its infancy, its fish development is still more so. It 
has been estimated by a member of the United States Fish 
Commission that there are one hundred and twenty-five 
varieties of edible fish in Alaskan waters of which at 
present only twenty are being used. Even so. the value 
of the fish productions since the purchase until 1917 is 
$300,000,000. The estimate for 1918 alone is $55,- 
000.000. 

Next in value, perhaps, come the furs. Included in 
these are sealskin, fox of many kinds, mink, ermine, lynx, 
marten, bear, wolf, land otter, beaver, muskrat. and other 
minor skins. It has been estimated that the beaver skins 
alone, if protected for twenty years, would pay the cost 
of Alaska. Before the discovery of gold and the develop- 
ment of the fisheries, furs were Alaska's greatest resource. 
The Indians were the principal trappers, and the Hudson 
Bay Company and the Russian trading companies grew 



10 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

wealthy off the lustrous skins brought by these indefa- 
tigable native hunters. But the Indians have gone about 
other business, and too, other resources have come to the 
front, and so though Alaska's furs are almost as abundant 
and every whit as beautiful as of old, they do not stand 
out so prominently as they did in days past as a source of 
wealth. But they are nevertheless one of the Territory's 
great offerings, and if all of Alaska's furs were suddenly 
swept off the market the world would decidedly feel the 
loss. 

Of Alaska's timber little is heard. But one can steam 
for thousands of miles along its coast line, every foot of 
which is crowded densely with trees. One can ride for 
other thousands of miles up and down its navigable rivers 
and see the same story of densely wooded shores. It is 
estimated that there is an excess of eighty billion feet of 
merchantable timber in Alaska. This timber except in 
the southeastern section is not large. But it is quite suit- 
able for paper pulp. And when it is remembered that we 
are dependent upon Canada for much of our paper pulp 
and, before the war, upon countries over seas, it is easily 
seen what the development of this industry in our own 
domain would mean to us. It would appreciably reduce 
the cost of every newspaper and magazine, of every bag 
and piece of wrapping paper we use. 

The reindeer industry has but begun. Nature has 
freely provided food for them in almost unlimited quan- 
tity, and in return they give man a mode of travel adapted 
to the country, meat, skin useful in various ways, and 
many other by-products. In fact, it is claimed that every 
part of the reindeer is of use, and that in time large quan- 
tities of reindeer meat will be shipped to the States. It is 
looked upon as one of Alaska's most valuable coming in- 
dustries. 



Alaska at a Glance 11 

Although agriculture in Alaska will never undertake to 
compete with agriculture in the States, there are suffi- 
ciently good agricultural lands to raise many things for 
home consumption. The farming area in Alaska has 
been computed to equal that of Pennsylvania, Maryland, 
Delaware, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and 
New Hampshire. Home products will greatly reduce the 
cost of living as well as provide an opening for those who 
both wish to farm and live in Alaska. 

Alaska's commerce is also an asset to be considered. In 
one year recently it amounted to $110,000,000. In that 
year it exported twice its purchase price in gold, six times 
the price in copper and three times in fish. No country 
of the world has such a showing per capita, especially 
when it is considered that this commerce is limited to a 
region reached by water transportation alone. 

These are its known resources, its already started in- 
dustries. But it offers many opportunities for the cre- 
ation of new enterprises, and new sources of wealth are 
frequently coming to light. Just recently there have been 
discovered on the Pribilof Islands large bone deposits 
which according to the Secretary of Commerce, repre- 
sent the accumulation of a century or more and are prob- 
ably the largest known bone deposits in the world. Their 
fertilizing properties as shown by analysis are high, and 
the country is greatly in need of such material. The uti- 
lization of them will mean not only a fresh and almost 
inexhaustible source of supply of this necessary article 
but a new industry for Alaska, and opportunities for work 
that will ramify in many directions. 

These facts show that Alaska is what one writer has 
called it, " an amazing young Territory." But astounding 
as they may seem to those unfamiliar with them, the story 
of Alaska's extraordinary features is not yet all told. 



12 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Its size is a matter of surprise to many. In area it is 
equal to about one-fifth of the United States. To fully 
grasp just how great is this extent of territory, a compar- 
ison with familiar places is helpful. Superimposed upon 
the map of the United States, Alaska covers Wisconsin, 
Illinois, Minnesota, Iowa, and the larger parts of Mis- 
souri, Kansas and Nebraska. When the size of these 
states is recalled, it will be seen what a tremendous realm 
Alaska is. It is really an empire, as it has been called. 

In comparison with the eastern part of our country it 
equals in size the thirteen original colonies with Maine, 
Vermont, Ohio, Indiana, Tennessee, Kentucky and Mich- 
igan added. New England is lost in it. It is greater 
than the area of Norway, Sweden and Finland combined. 
It is three times the size of France. 

Its range of latitude is as great as from New Orleans to 
Duluth, and its climate is almost as varied. It is not 
the uniformly cold country, even in winter, that has been 
believed. A comparison with the weather reports of 
various cities in the United States and Canada with those 
of representative Alaskan towns on the sixth of January 
recently showed that Sitka had the same temperature as 
Los Angeles and San Francisco. Thirty-three other 
towns were lower. Twenty places in the United States 
had a lower record than Dutch Harbor on the Aleutian 
Islands. Six places were lower than Eagle on the Yukon 
River. Twelve places were lower than Nome. Two 
places were lower than Tanana in the interior, and eight- 
een places lower than Valdez on the coast. Denver, 
Huron and Winnipeg were colder than any place in 
Alaska where weather records could be secured. 

The town of Seward, the ocean terminus of the gov- 
ernment railroad, is fifteen hundred miles nearer the 
Philippines than is San Francisco. The island of Una- 



Alaska at a Glance 13 

laska is as far west of San Francisco as this city of the 
Golden Gate is west of Washington, D. C. The shortest 
trans-Pacific route from Seattle to Yokohama runs north 
of the Aleutian Islands. 

The shore line of Alaska is twenty-six thousand miles, 
a length greater than the circumference of the earth. This 
has a value perhaps not generally considered. It points 
of course to prolific fishing grounds both commercially 
and for the sportsman, but it means also bays, coves, in- 
lets, and winding waterways innumerable that offer a 
pleasure ground for summer cruising unmatched in the 
world. The southeastern part of this great labyrinth of 
water highways is in the main protected from the ocean, 
and is as safe for small launches as any inland river or 
lake. The scenery is enchanting, game and fish abundant, 
wood plentiful. The most delightful summer holidays 
can be spent winding in and out of these channels and 
fiords. Not only can quietude and beauty be enjoyed but 
many places can be visited otherwise inaccessible. The 
larger boats cannot or do not go into these smaller bays 
and fiords. Glacier Bay, where is Muir Glacier, twenty of 
whose tributaries are each greater than the Mer de Glace ; 
Rudyerd Bay, named for the English engineer Rudyerd 
who rebuilt the Eddystone lighthouse: the great Mala- 
spina Glacier; deserted Indian villages with their gro- 
tesque totems, and many other such places off the beaten 
track can be sought out and enjoyed. That such trips are 
quite practicable is proven by the fact that John Muir 
travelled eight hundred miles from Wrangell along the 
coast in a canoe, going as far north as the upper end of 
Lynn Canal. 

Such is Alaska at a glance, a region of beauty that 
enthralls the senses and of resources that amaze the mind. 
It is a pioneer land practically at our doors in the twen- 



14 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



tieth century, a land in many sections as undeveloped as 
the great West seventy years ago, but whose opportuni- 
ties can be reached easily and in comfort, and whose 
primeval solitudes, snow-crowned peaks, and majestic gla- 
ciers can be viewed from the deck chair or observation 
car. 



CHAPTER II 

FROM SEATTLE NORTHWARD 

A WORD AS TO STEAMER ROUTES. ThE BEAUTY THAT GREETS ONE AT 
THE VERY START. VICTORIA AND ITS INTERESTS. AlERT BaY AND 

A potlatch. Totem poles. Their history and meaning. 

It would seem as if nature had especially prepared the 
highway leading to Alaska so that every part of a trip 
thither might be delightful. The Inside Passage, as the 
stretch of waterways leading to Alaska is called, has few 
if any counterparts in the world. There are but two 
places, it is said, that even lend themselves to comparison, 
one a similar passage on the southwestern coast of South 
America, and the other the fiords of Norway. The coast 
of South America is at present little known, and though 
Norway is famed for its beauty, those who have travelled 
there, and even many Norwegians themselves, admit that 
the coast of Alaska surpasses it for sublimity. But com- 
parisons are not necessary. Each part of the world has 
its individual appeal, and the Inside Passage has a love- 
liness, a charm, and a grandeur sufficient to elate any lover 
of natural beauty. 

There are various lines of steamers running from 
Seattle to Alaska. Some go only as far as Skagway at 
the head of Lynn Canal. Others go westward to Seward 
and Anchorage, the coast terminals of the government 
railroad. Still others go to Nome, farther north on Be- 
ring Sea. There are several American lines, one Cana- 
dian line, and among those running only to Skagway some 

15 



16 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

smaller boats whose fares are less than the larger steam- 
ers. So that one has wide choice. A good plan is to 
divide the trip between the American and Canadian boats, 
going by one and returning by the other. In this way 
one will be enabled to see all the ports along the coast, for 
the American boats do not stop at some of the Canadian 
towns nor the Canadian boats at a few of the American 
cities. But by using both lines all the towns can be seen, 
and they are so quaint and interesting none should be 
missed. 

The Canadian Pacific line is delightful to travel upon. 
The boats are built with an observation room forward, 
with large windows and big easy chairs in front of each 
window. The arrangement is much that of a parlor car 
except that in place of the rather cramped quarters of a 
car is a good-sized room with cosy corners and an electric 
grate fire giving a cheerful glow if the day is chill. 

The table service is that of a well-appointed home. Not 
only are the menu and cooking all that can be desired, but 
the china, silver and little things of the table are of the 
sort to satisfy the most fastidious. 

Charts of the route are posted where the passengers 
can easily study them, also typed information about the 
places at which the steamer stops. Every detail that will 
add to the pleasure of the trip has been thought of. There 
is as well an atmosphere of courtesy and kindliness upon 
the part of all in charge that increases the enjoyment of 
the voyage. In fact, the surroundings and the attentive 
thought fulness make one feel as if he were a guest in the 
home of a friend and robs the journey of much of the 
ordinary atmosphere of travelling. 

One of the American lines also has its boats built on 
this plan of the observation room. It is an excellent idea 
in boat construction for such a trip as this. There is no 



From Seattle Northward 17 

part of the journey where the scenery does not lure, and 
with this arrangement one can gaze at it entirely protected 
from sun and wind and quite at ease in a big, comfortable 
chair. 

The waterfront at Seattle presents a vivid picture of 
bustle and beauty as the steamer waits for lines to be 
cast off. The buildings of the city dominated by the high 
Smith tower rise tier upon tier, impressive in their orderly, 
business-like aspect. Up and down the long line of piers, 
sombre dock buildings range side by side, attractive in 
their very air of homely usefulness. Across the harbor, 
green heights rise sharply, prettily bright with flowers 
and homes. A slight haze softens the outline of distant 
hills, and the red smokestack of a passing boat adds a 
vivid note of color. 

The steamer glides smoothly from its moorings, so 
smoothly that it is the receding of the dock that gives the 
first intimation that the voyage has begun. Soon sky- 
scrapers and piers and shipyards and the noises of the 
busy world of work are left behind. The shore sweeps 
out here and there into sharp points thickly wooded. To 
the west, the Olympic Mountains begin to appear, softly, 
hazily blue and crowned with snow. Here and there 
along the densely forested shores a column of smoke rises 
among the trees telling of industries busily providing for 
the needs of other parts of the globe. 

Through a world of blue water, green shores, and 
mistily blue mountains, the steamer glides for hours. 
Under the brilliant sun the water sparkles as if encrusted 
with silver and sprinkled with diamonds. Over the tops 
of the deep green spruce and fir of the shore rise on both 
sides of the channel tier upon tier of blue mountains, the 
distant ones gleaming purely white on their summits. The 
blue of these mountains is a peculiarly soft, tender color. 



18 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

melting almost imperceptibly into the blue of the sky. In- 
deed, were it not for the mountain outlines, and here and 
there shadows, one could scarcely distinguish the moun- 
tains at times from the cloud scenery. But it is this very 
delicacy, like a faint pencilling, that makes them so lovely. 
And, shining more brilliantly than the clouds, are their 
snowy caps which call attention, like a clear voice, to their 
faint, subtle loveliness. 

The hours slip by unnoticed in these enchanted waters 
and almost before one has realized how they have sped, 
the lower end of Vancouver Island appears and the 
steamer swings in for Victoria. 

The approach to Victoria is particularly beautiful. A 
narrow winding channel leads between densely wooded 
shores, past a breakwater and islands with tiny light- 
houses, and sweeps in almost a semicircle up to the dock. 
Looking backward, the eye is carried from the blue 
waters, the tiny lighthouses, the green shore, to an amphi- 
theatre of blue and white mountains encircling the harbor, 
some rising above the banks of clouds with all the serene 
beauty of Fujiyama. 

But the beauty of the scene is broken by a raucous 
voice rolling out over the water through a megaphone 
advising the tourists that the only way to see the town in 
the time at their disposal is in the cars of the owner of 
said voice. He stands, a lonely figure on a pier that 
stretches far out into the harbor, and his voice rolls on 
until it is drowned in the scornful toot of the whistle as 
the boat draws into the dock. But here another stentor 
takes up the tale, and as he begins on a foundation of 
interest already laid, and as he adds a clever jingle to his 
seductive appeal, he gets the most of the customers. 

Victoria is a clean, bright, substantial town with wide 
streets and pretty homes set amidst beautiful flower 



iJ§f^ 




From Seattle Northward 19 

gardens. Indeed it is the greenness and floweriness of the 
city that makes its strongest appeal to many, though it 
has. too, the substantial Old World air that somehow an 
English town always seems to acquire no matter where 
planted. 

Victoria is the capital of British Columbia. The Par- 
liament buildings, the government offices and an interest- 
ing museum are the chief places of note. Beacon Hill 
Park is a delightful bit of woods, and the grassy downs 
of Oak Bay provide links for golfers. 

The town is the outgrowth of old Fort Victoria, estab- 
lished by the Hudson Bay Company in 1842. Vancouver 
Island, upon whose southern point it lies, was discovered 
by Juan de Fuca in 1 592. Vancouver surv^eyed its coasts 
in 1793, and it was named in his honor. The island is 
sparsely inhabited, though it is rich in minerals and 
timber, and has some good agricultural land; but the 
mining of coal is at present the chief industry. 

Steaming out again through Victoria's pretty harbor, 
the boat now takes almost a straight course north across 
the Gulf of Georgia for the city of Vancouver. The 
water highway begins to expand, the shores fade into a 
blue line in the distance, but the merging of blue waters, 
blue shore lines, and the low blue hills is very lovely. Low 
points of bare rock run out here and there from the shore. 
Islands with tiny lighthouses on them dot the waters. 
Sail-boats lend their graceful beauty. The Olympic 
Mountains on the west and the Cascade Mountains on the 
east enclose the scene of silvery water and wooded shore 
with a background of snowy peaks. To the southeast, 
Mt. Baker, shadowy and serene, towers over all, a faint 
white cone assuring one it is a mountain and not a cloud 
only by its unchanging form. 

As Vancouver is approached, the scenery grows wilder. 



20 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



Great, towering mountains crowd down to the water's 
edge, and the snow-capped ones seem but a hand's throw 
away. Again the steamer winds through a narrow, pic- 
turesque channel up to its dock. 

It is not so many years since Vancouver was a post of 
that " Honourable Company of Merchant Adventurers 
Trading into Hudson Bay," the strictly correct name of 
the Hudson Bay Company and ever so much more ro- 
mantic and surely more enjoyable to work under than its 
present shortened form. The town was then a little strag- 
gling frontier settlement such as is even yet seen in some 
parts of Alaska. But is to-day one of the important 
business ports of the Pacific coast with wide busy streets, 
handsome buildings, and all that goes to make a 
modern city. Stanley Park stands perhaps as its best 
representative of progressiveness, for such things are 
usually the last expression of a city's civic spirit. This 
park is a fine pleasure ground for the people of almost a 
thousand acres. The giant trees of its virgin forest and 
the great Siwash Rock carved by nature into the resem- 
blance of an Indian head are the chief objects of interest. 
A motor road winds along the shore, giving enchanting 
views of harbor and distant mountains, and leads to 
English Bay, a place of beach diversions, promenades, 
bathing, and all the gay life of an English seaside water- 
ing place. 

Beyond Vancouver the wider waters of the Gulf of 
Georgia are soon left behind and the steamer enters one 
of the many narrow channels that thread the Inside 
Passage like silver ribbons. The vista ahead is much 
like that of a winding river, except that no river ever had 
such an enchanting background nor such beautiful shores. 
Point after point of land stretches out into the water, 
crowded densely with slender, spear-tipped spruce. Island 



From Seattle Northward 21 

after island dots the water, forested with the same thick 
green. Wherever the eye wanders is an entrancing picture 
of silvery water, green shores, tree-crowned islands, and in 
the far view* in every direction, majestic snow mountains. 

At times the channel onward seems entirely blocked as if 
the boat were sailing into some little cove or land-locked 
harbor, but the vessel swings around a point and again an 
entrancing waterway lures between high green mountains 
and wooded islands, and again the serene, far-off snow 
mountains fill the background with their glittering peaks. 
Here and there a tiny lighthouse perched on a jutting 
rock gives a sense of friendly watchful guardianship. 

Thus, threading shining waterway after waterway, 
gliding quietly by cape after cape, slender promontory af- 
ter promontory, along mile after mile of densely wooded 
shores, past peak after peak that soars in unbroken suc- 
cession thousands of feet in the air, sweeping into larger 
bays and lakelike expanses where shore line and mountain 
meet in a tender, ethereal blue, then again into narrow 
channels with luring, ever-changing, on-leading vistas, 
the hours slip by without hint of weariness. 

An interesting stop after Vancouver is Alert Bay, a 
collection of frame buildings that one hesitates to call 
houses, and smells, noticeably smells. The buildings 
stretch along the shore of a curving blue bay beyond which 
rises a magnificent mountain range; and the enchanting 
view somewhat alleviates the odors. 

Several piers run picturesquely out into the water, 
throwing black shadow^s that crimple and bend with the 
movement of the waves. The beach is well filled with 
Indian canoes, long, graceful, sharply pointed. A few 
" gas " boats ride at anchor, staunch and businesslike, far 
more profitable no doubt for fishing than the canoe but 
lacking its grace, beauty and touch with the primeval. 



22 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Back of the buildings that line the one side of the 
street, the land rises steeply, brightly green with grass 
and birch and alder and a few fruit trees with here and 
there the dark sombre foliage of the spruce and fir. Some 
well-kept gardens, a few lilac bushes, yellow broom in 
blossom, sunshiny dandelions, and other wild flowers 
make the one little street cheerful. Stately slow-pacing 
Indian women and Indian men in red blankets move 
slowly about and eye the visitor silently, curiously. 

At the lower end of the village is the hospital and In- 
dian graveyard, " a significant proximity," a tourist idly 
remarks. The graveyard is reached by a charming, tree- 
embowered walk along the blue waters of the harbor with 
delightful vistas caught now and then of the far away 
snowy mountains. 

The little graveyard is among the trees on the sloping 
hillside with grasses growing almost as high as the picket 
fences that enclose the graves. In many of these en- 
closures is a totem pole, " probably the family tombstone," 
one tourist hazards. 

On the way back to the dock, almost in the shadow of a 
totem pole, an Indian wrestled with a huge can of ice 
cream while overhead the wires of the government tele- 
phone service hummed in the trees. The edges of two 
civilizations are meeting in this little town in the wilder- 
ness and it will not be very long before the one will dis- 
appear before the other. Much that is picturesque and 
some that is artistic will go, but also will go other things 
not so desirable, among them, it is to be hoped, the smells. 

A ceremony that was luckily stumbled on at Alert Bay 
was a potlatch. A stout Indian gentleman in white men's 
clothes and a big felt hat stood in a small building en- 
closed on three sides addressing some Indians gathered 
about him and a little group of others in red blankets 



From Seattle Northward 23 

squatted near by on the grass. Their faces were abso- 
lutely impassive. Near him was a pile of blankets, and 
fiom time to time one of these was taken and bestowed on 
some one in the listening group. 

It was much like a Christmas or birthday gathering at 
home except that the Indian is much more adept than his 
white brother in concealing that happy, expectant look 
worn when gifts are about to be bestowed, or the disap- 
pointment that creeps out despite staunch efforts if the 
gift is not what was ardently hoped for. When the 
blankets were all gone the crowd dispersed, still some- 
what stolid, and the stout benevolent Indian went home 
much uplifted in spirit it is to be hoped, though much 
poorer in earthly possessions. 

This sort of potlatch is far from being like the original 
ceremony in picturesqueness. The potlatch was at one 
time a great event in Indian life. It was a perfectly 
systematized distribution of gifts involving much more 
thoughtful consideration and balancing of obligations 
than the giving of a social entertainment by a member of 
the Four Hundred. The more frequently and liberally 
an Indian distributed his property the better was his 
standing with the others, the greater his chance of reach- 
ing the dignity of chief of the village, and the more was 
due him when some one else gave, results not unknown in 
communities other than Indian. 

An ordinary member of a tribe confined his potlatch to 
those of his own village, but a chief usually sent out invi- 
tations to certain individuals of other villages. Before 
doing this, however, he called together his friends and 
relatives and with their help made out a list of persons 
to whom he intended to give and the articles for each. It 
was often the custom, however, before calling together 
these friends to quietly distribute his property among the 



24 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

principal people of the village who, by etiquette, were re- 
quired just before the time set for the potlatch to return 
the gift with interest. So that it may be supposed a pot- 
latch was not always a season of rejoicing to those most 
intimately concerned. 

When the day of the great event arrived, hosts and 
guests arrayed themselves in ceremonial attire. This 
ceremonial dress for a potlatch was in many tribes quite 
elaborate. If the occasion was for the purpose of raising 
a house, cutting out and erecting a new carved column, or 
undertaking some new industrial enterprise, and pot- 
latches were given for all such reasons, the feasting and 
dancing were interspersed with work, and the gifts were 
presented only to the workers. But if it was a potlatch 
unconnected with any such enterprise every one received 
gifts. In both cases the distribution was the final act. The 
guests assembled, the goods were displayed on the floor, 
on poles, wherever they could be shown to advantage. 
The host sat or stood arrayed in his ceremonial attire and 
with a ceremonial baton. A herald blew a call and an- 
nounced the opening of the ceremony in a speech extolling 
the liberality and the virtues of the host, and then called 
a name. An attendant took the present and placed it in 
front of the one to whom it was given. On the announce- 
ment of each name the host solemnly nodded his head and 
thumped on the floor with his baton. It was all very 
solemn, very formal, very rich in gay headdresses, blank- 
ets, beads, paint and moccasins. When all had been dis- 
tributed, songs were sung, dances performed, and all was 
over. 

With the advance of education among the natives, the 
potlatch is dying out. Those in charge of Indian schools 
make no direct attack upon Indian customs, but they en- 
deavor indirectly to lead the natives to see for themselves 



From Seattle Northward 25 



the unwisdom of some of their practices. The Indians 
make themselves poor by some of these potlatches, as they 
frequently give away everything of value they possess, 
and must start again at the beginning to acquire the 
necessities of life. The teachers lead them by deft ques- 
tions and discussions to think practically upon this and to 
see if it pays. 

Undoubtedly, to the Indian, the potlatch brings some 
reward of the spirit not sensed entirely from the practical 
side of life, for the Indian has a viewpoint not always 
grasped by others. John Muir tells that upon one occa- 
sion, when returning from a glacial expedition wet and 
cold, he was met by an old chief as wet and cold as him- 
self who said, " As soon as I saw you coming back, I was 
ashamed to think I had been sitting warm and dry at my 
fire while you were out in the storm; therefore I made 
haste to strip off my clothing and put on these wet rags 
to share your misery and to show how much I love you." 

Most of us would have thought we could have shown 
our love better and also a decidedly larger amount of com- 
mon sense by having warm, dry clothing for the traveller. 
But, no doubt, the Indian got something of value from 
his act. The abolishing of Indian customs requires a 
reverent and careful hand. 

More interesting, however, than the potlatch at Alert 
Bay are the totem poles, for here are the first to be en- 
countered on the trip. 

" Beware the Jabberwock, my son, 

The jaws that bite, the claws that catch ; 
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun 
The frumious Bandersnatch." 

one is inclined to mutter as he walks up and down the 
one street of the village and studies the totem poles in 



26 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



front of the houses. " Curiouser and cu.riouser," he men- 
tally continues to quote as he gazes upon these weird, un- 
couth figures upreared before almost every Indian home. 
For these strange columns that are encountered through- 
out the southeastern part of Alaska do, if one knows 
little totem pole lore, arouse all one's curiosity and put 
his wits on their mettle to explain. 

Each tourist, unlearned in the legend of the totem, has 
his explanation. " A family crest," says one. " The 
family tombstone," says another. " The family genea- 
logical tree," says a third. " The first efforts of the fam- 
ily genius," conjectures a fourth, recalling perhaps per- 
sonal experiences. And a thin, querulous man who con- 
scientiously took notes throughout the trip inscribed in 
his diary, " Tad poles. Strange, wooden columns dec- 
orated with attempted portrayals of men and birds. In- 
dians poor artists. Could make better looking faces my- 
self. Most of the folks call them totem poles. Never 
heard the word. Mean tad poles." 

Little fault could have been found with one pole, a 
neutrally painted column surmounted with a graceful bird 
with outstretched wings. But few of the poles displayed 
this simplicity or charm. One had at the top a man wear- 
ing a close resemblance to the stovepipe hat of civilization. 
Below him stood a stout gentleman with a smile from ear 
to ear and with his hands folded complacently over his 
stomach. Evidently he had dined well. Beneath him was 
a figure with his hands also on his stomach but with a far 
less happy expression. His wife was a poor cook. Thus 
the alien reads the story. Many of the figures have long 
horse faces. There is a decided display of teeth. The 
noses of some were never seen on sea or land. The ma- 
jority wore expressions resigned, belligerent or lugu- 
brious. Few really happy faces were to be seen. 



From Seattle Northward 27 

In colors the poles are as weird as in carving. One 
man had a complexion like a camouflaged boat. Sea 
green faces are not unusual. Great patches of blue about 
the eyes are not uncommon, and there is quite a preva- 
lence of black on the cheeks and chin. 

But as grotesque as these columns seem with their un- 
couth figures and strange colorings, much as they may 
arouse the conjecture and sarcasm and ribaldry of the 
tourist, they have to the Indian a poetic and sacred 
significance. 

To him they are a picture, a poem, and a religion. The 
very uncouthness of the figures is intended and has a 
meaning. It carries his thoughts back to the dim begin- 
nings of time when man and bird and beast were not, in 
his belief, as they are now, but far more wonderful be- 
ings. These figures stand for vast realms of imagination 
in which his fancy roams and creates what it will. The 
poles also mean family history, the prowess of ancestors, 
the traditions that incite to brave deeds, that help to en- 
dure trial with dignity, that make one a worthy member 
of the tribe. 

Totemism is not confined to the Indians of Alaska but 
is found among many savage tribes in various parts of 
the world. Most tribes possess a set of beliefs and prac- 
tices mythological, religious, ceremonial, artistic, and 
economic that grow from their attitude toward animals, 
plants, and inanimate objects. These beliefs and prac- 
tices govern their mode of life and give rise to their forms 
of worship. Totemism in its original and widespread 
significance represented this combination of social organ- 
ization and religious belief. This idea still lingers with 
the Alaskan Indians in the significance the totem has in 
regard to their family and the family myths and super- 
stitions. 



28 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

These Indians believe they are descended from some 
bird, beast, fish, or other object, and take this as their 
symbol. The emblem chosen is carved or painted on all 
belongings and is regarded as the visible manifestation of 
some powerful mystical being who has to do with their 
welfare. The totem carries with it certain obligations. 
Those with the same crest, for instance, cannot inter- 
marry. It is, one might say, a symbolic way of express- 
ing certain laws that hold in civilized communities. 

The Alaskan totem pole is of three kinds. One is the 
family totem and is the one seen in front of the Indian 
houses. It represents the totem of the family and rela- 
tions. Another is the death totem in which the ashes of 
the departed are placed. The third is the " story master " 
totem and illustrates some remarkable event. 

Any one versed in totem lore can read these totems as 
he would a book. It is said that of the present tribes, the 
Hydahs best understand the totem and can read one, es- 
pecially the story master totem, for an hour or more, 
whereas a member of some other tribes will get only the 
briefest and most superficial tale. 

A tourist gazing at a totem with an eagle, a bear hold- 
ing two whales, and with a seal below, would probably see 
in the grotesque carving merely something to idly specu- 
late about or pass a joke on. But a Hydah Indian would 
read the story of two of his tribe belonging respectively 
to the Eagle and Bear families who went hunting seals, 
were drowned and turned into whales. It would bring 
to mind the belief that whenever a Hydah is lost at sea 
he becomes a whale and the kindly feeling this tribe has 
for whales. It is said that whenever these Indians see 
whales they throw overboard fresh water that the spirits 
of friends or relatives inhabiting these whales may have 
something fresh to drink. 



From Seattle Northward 29 

Some of these totems are rather modern. One at 
Kasan, some fifty feet high, has at the top an eagle, the 
totem of the great chief Skwall; then the head of a Rus- 
sian saint, that of the archangel Michael; then, a Russian 
bishop, and, lastly, that of a white man surmounted by an 
eagle. It was erected to commemorate the baptism of the 
chief of the family into the Russian church at Sitka. 

The different tribes have their quaint legends, too, as 
to the original adoption of these symbols. The Hydahs 
tell a story of the deluge in which all things were drowned 
but the raven. This bird, while sitting on the beach after 
the waters had subsided, saw a huge shell thrown up by the 
waves. After much effort he opened it and out came a 
number of small people who warmly thanked the raven 
for their deliverance and promised always to care for him. 
Thus the Hydahs came and this is the reason the raven is 
their principal totem. 

The eagle, the bear, the frog, and other animals seen on 
the totem poles usually have some myth connected with 
their appropriation by the family that claims them. These 
myths are almost innumerable, and when one can read a 
totem as the Indians read it. he finds it a poem of the 
primeval, wild in its imagery, simple in its beauty, and 
inspiring in its truth. The ravens that soar through the 
blue, Alaskan sky, the eagle that swoops over the waters 
and up into some dead tree along shore, the bear that 
prowls through the woods, take on a new significance. He 
begins to see w-ith Indian eyes, and a tinge of romance and 
interest is given these birds and beasts of the wald that 
lends fresh zest to the trip. 



ciiArri'K 111 

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" I'll- TV ii>i ix. l'\>i<iA. du I'^t.ur." NA^^Ks rI'-aunisckn r ok 

1 AKl \ KXriOUKKS Is. t' \i HIK AN ANO SIPU lUll'S. \VkAN(;KLI., 

ns lusroKx am> n vri's of invkkkst. 

I'^Kcm AUmI K.iv tin- stoatiuM' swings out into Ijucon 
riuuioUo Souiul, atnl 1km o the swells oi the raoitic ina\ 
he U-h tot' a tow houis. The trip to southoastorn Alaska 
is, in the luain, as smooth as a sail on a livor. At two 
in>nits o\\\\ ilo the waves ot" the Tacitie roll in willunit 
break aiul this onlv tor a brief time. I'heti the shelterins; 
islands be>;in a>;am aiul the vxatei' is as tranqnil as the 
iarthest mlaiul rner or plaeiil lake. It is this that makes 
the trip so iinuine, h'or a thonsaiul miles, the waterwav 
stretelies embosoiiied in the most ma>;nilieenf seenerv in 
the worUI. ^'et this trip ean be taken bv the most timid 
oi water travellei's vvithont a qualm. 

Alter the open waters o\ Oneen cliarlotte Somul are 
lelt behiiul bei;ins one ot the loveliest of the wiiulini; 
vvalerwavs ot the iomnev. .\t times the passa_i;e is so 
narrow it seems as it' one ean almost toneh the _i;rasses 
i^Towuij;' aloiij; the shore, or piek the lovelv wild tlowers 
that bri_t;liten i;ra\ IvnUlers or give glowm;; notes of eolor 
under the sombre spruee. 

Islands are everyvxhere, erow ded to their verv edge 
with trees, arrani;ed so sMumetrieally thev appear to have 
beeti planted by hand to give a neat, orderly appearance 



Into American Waters 31 

to these islets. Some of the islands are quite round in 
shape and look like a ball of rich green in the blue water. 
Others have sharp points with trees in single rows daintily 
stepping to their very extremity as if to lend a note of 
I)icturesque variety. 

At times the shores run .steeply up into green, towering 
mountains making the passage seem a dark, awe-inspiring 
fiord; again the banks sink lower and beyond are great 
snowy peaks. 

At night, when the course winds around jutting points 
and into seemingly landlocked bays, the friendly gleam of 
tiny lighthouses beams out and seems to say, " Come on, 
you're safe." As the boat twists and turns, near at hand 
and far ahead flash these messages of guidance. Night- 
fall in these northern latitudes is often but a matter of 
color, a coming for a brief while of purple shadows on the 
mountains and along the shore. But the little lighthou.ses 
go on duty and as cheerily blink away through the twi- 
light as though darkness had fallen. 

These Alaskan nights, which are not night as we know 
it, often have most glorious sunsets. At eight, nine, ten 
o'clock, according to the latitude, for the sun seems loath 
to depart in the summer, massive purple clouds pile up in 
the western sky. Nature fires her sunset gun and the 
whole mass is lighted from behind as if with flames. The 
fretted edges are tinged with lines of fire. Through nar- 
row openings the glorious crimson pours out. tingeing the 
waves with red, which shades in the distance to a lovely 
salmon pink. Mountains take on a rosy hue, those that 
are cone-shaped seeming to be flaming volcanoes. 

Then, just as the sun drops, the clouds part as if a 
master stage manager had drawn aside the curtains, and, 
for a moment, it is seen, a great, glowing, red ball. Then 
it disappears in the crimson waves. The colors begin to 



32 Alaska, Onr Beautiful Nortliland 

pale. The world turns a faint, ethereal amethystine color 
and then a rich violet blue settles softly over the moun- 
tains. The patches of snow gleam gray-white. The 
water grows black in the shadow of the hills. But far 
aloft the sky is still brightly clear with that peculiar purity 
of tone for which these northern skies are noted, till grad- 
ually the light grows brighter and day begins to dawn. 

One does not get up to see a sunrise in Alaska. He 
stays up and then goes to bed. 

The next point of call for the Canadian boats is Prince 
Rupert. This is the terminus for Canada's latest trans- 
continental railroad and is quite new and modern. The 
little town nestles against forest clothed hills and rises, 
tier upon tier, up the side of the mountain. So steep is 
the ascent that the planked streets are frequently built on 
trestles on the descending ground beneath, and the fronts 
of houses in order to be on a level with the street are built 
on pilings while the back part rests upon the solid moun- 
tain rock. But in spite of these obstacles, it is a cheery 
little place with great hopes for its future. It is the 
nearest Pacific port to the great ports of the Orient. It 
has lumber, minerals, and a great grain region to draw 
upon, and its people believe that some day it will be one of 
the great cities of the Pacific. 

It has one asset rather unique in this part of the world 
— a natural hot salt water bathing place. Near the beach 
is a little inland bay, if one may so call it, and two lakes. 
When the tide goes out, these are left dry, and the earth 
grows hot under the warm rays of the sun. When the 
tide returns, the heat from the earth warms the water, 
and the people of Prince Rupert flock there for their hot 
salt water baths. 

Beyond Prince Rupert is a most interesting place. Old 
Metlakatla, where William Duncan, Father Duncan as he 



Into American Waters 33 

was later called, began the missionary work among the 
northwest Indians that eventually attracted worldwide 
attention. 

When sea captains and explorers began to return to 
England from the northwest coast of America during the 
middle of the last century they brought horrible tales of 
the barbarous cruelties practised by the natives. These 
tales aroused the compassion of Duncan and fired him 
with zeal to attempt the civilization of these tribes. He 
was holding a lucrative position at the time but he decided 
to give it up and enter upon this work. 

Many tried to persuade him from such a seemingly 
hopeless task, even Sir James Douglas, the Governor, 
doing all in his power when Duncan reached Victoria to 
stop him from so recklessly throwing away his life. But 
Duncan would not be turned aside, and went to Fort 
Simpson, a post of the Hudson Bay Company, and began 
his work. 

The fort itself was indicative of the temperament of 
the Indians. It was protected by palisades of heavy tim- 
ber, had massive gates, and was flanked with four bastions 
with galleries mounted with cannon. Sentinels kept 
watch day and night, and when the Indians came to trade, 
so treacherous were they known to be, that only a few 
were admitted at a time. 

Undaunted by what he saw and heard, Duncan bent 
himself to the task ahead of him. His first work was to 
learn the language. This language abounds in metaphor 
and Duncan knew he must get not only the words but the 
Indian's way of thinking and of using these words, if he 
really wanted to speak their native tongue. The value 
of this thorough work was shown by an incident that 
happened to a worker who came later into this field and 
who did not grasp, as had Duncan, the difference between 



34 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

the spoken word and the thought back of it. This new- 
missionary blandly addressed a group of Indians as 
" Children of the forest," a phrase he believed poetic and 
complimentary. Translated into the Indian thought this 
was, " Little men among many sticks or stumps," an im- 
plication the Indians resented, and the missionary had 
little success among them. 

Father Duncan made no such mistakes. He labored 
till he could reach them in their own picturesque phraseol- 
ogy, then he made a simple address explaining his mission. 
Also, through the Indian who was teaching him, he had 
let it be known that he had come to tell them of the white 
man's God and also many things that would be helpful 
to them. He thus aroused their curiosity, and when 
finally he opened a school at the house of a chief, it was 
eagerly attended by both old and young. The attendance 
grew, and, eventually, a log schoolhouse was built. 

Father Duncan was shrewd enough to realize that along 
with the moral lessons he was anxious to inculcate must 
go some practical benefits, if he wanted to make the im- 
pression he desired. So he introduced certain industrial 
enterprises. The first of these was soap making. At his 
coming the Indians were obliged to pay one mink skin for 
a very small piece of common yellow soap. They were 
quick to see the economy of making their own. 

His efforts to improve their condition morally and in- 
dustrially quickly aroused the opposition of the medicine 
men of the tribe who saw their influence slipping away, 
and of the Hudson Bay Company who saw their profits 
disappearing. Both tried to break up his work, and many 
times he had narrow escapes from attempts on his life. 
Such things had no efifect upon him personally, but certain 
pernicious influences at the fort, he saw, did retard the 
work, so he decided to move and establish a model town. 



Into American Waters 35 

The site of what is now Old Metlakatla was chosen. It 
was a good fishing and hunting ground, had a fine harbor 
and rich soil. A set of rules for conduct was drawn up 
to which each who went must subscribe. About thirty 
agreed, and the little colony moved to their new home. In 
about a week thirty more canoes came bringing about 
three hundred Indians, including two chiefs. 

Father Duncan saw it would be wise to place some of 
the responsibility of government upon the Indians them- 
selves. A village council of twelve was elected, a native 
constabulary formed, taxes in the form of ])lankets and 
clothing imposed for such public works as drainage, 
roads, and public grounds. Evil forms of amusement, 
such as gambling, were replaced with healthy athletics 
and games. 

The work prospered. The Hudson Bay Company, be- 
cause of loss of profitable trade, refused to bring the little 
colony supplies, and Duncan bought a boat and did his 
own trading. The Indians themselves subscribed to this, 
and when they received their profits from the venture and 
were made to understand how these profits were gained, 
they instantly named the boat, " Kahah," slave, for, said 
they, " It does all the work. We reap profit." 

A village cooperative store was established and a 
savings bank. Here again the figurative language of the 
Indians is seen, for when the dividends were declared and 
the method explained to them, they said, " The blankets 
have swollen." 

Finally it was decided to build a new village. The old 
houses were pulled down, and model homes, a church, 
town hall, shops, and other buildings erected. 

The growth of the colony and its prosperity attracted 
much comment and nearly all the distinguished visitors to 
this part of the world stopped to see it, and loud were their 



36 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

praises of the appearance of the town and of the improve- 
ment in the Indians. Trouble finally arose however with 
the Church of England about technical questions, and 
with the government on matters of land. As the best 
solution the colony decided to move over the boundary 
line into American territory. Annette Island was chosen, 
and here New Metlakatla was established. This was 
finally made a reservation by Act of Congress. 

The settlement was at first as successful as Old Met- 
lakatla, but with increasing years Father Duncan did not 
keep up with his progressive policy and the colony retro- 
graded. It has lately been taken in charge by the Bureau 
of Education for the natives and is again on the road to 
prosperity. 

Soon after Fort Simpson and the site of Old Met- 
lakatla are passed, the famous " Fifty-four, Forty, or 
Fight " line is crossed, though the traveller is not apt to 
know it, and he is now in Alaskan waters. This line 
marks the boundary between American and British terri- 
tory. Back in the last century, in '43 and '44, it came near 
getting the United States into trouble with Great Britain. 
The Russian dominions ended at latitude fifty- four, forty; 
the Spanish or Mexican with California. The region be- 
tween was generally known as Oregon and claimed by 
both Great Britain and the United States, though for 
years the dispute took no active form. But in 1842, 
settlers began to pour into Oregon and the controversy 
became acute. In 1844. the Democrats took the matter 
up and made a campaign issue of it with the slogan, 
" Fifty- four. Forty, or Fight." A compromise was finally 
effected. 

Nearly all these waters from Seattle northward have 
historic interest of one kind or another and many are 
reminiscent, in their names, of the early explorers. 



Into American Waters 37 

It was believed in the early days of the discovery of the 
Western Hemisphere that a passage could be found be- 
tween the Atlantic and Pacific and many were the navi- 
gators that sailed in search of it. In the course of their 
wanderings some found their way into this beautiful 
Inside Passage and some of the earliest believed this to 
be the long sought for channel, though they never fol- 
lowed it sufficiently to discover they were in error. 

One of these was Juan de Fuca, for whom the strait at 
the lower end of Vancouver Island has been named, 
though many navigators believed de Fuca never reached 
these waters and that his tales are purely mythical. But 
Michael Lok, a reputable English navigator, reports in his 
journal that de Fuca told him of passing " divers Hands in 
that Sayling and saw people on Land clad in Beast's 
skins," and that the land was " very fruitfull and rich of 
gold, silver, pearle and other things," which, whether he 
saw it or not, very aptly describes this section. 

Many other Spaniards sailed these waters and their 
presence is recalled to-day in such names as Revillagigedo, 
the island upon which Ketchikan is located and which was 
named for a viceroy of Mexico; Hecate Strait, between 
Queen Charlotte Islands and the mainland and named for 
St. Bruno Hecate. But Captain Cook and George Van- 
couver are the navigators who left the greatest number 
of names, and their nomenclature is met at every turn. 

The next stopping place is Ketchikan, and this is the 
first American port of entry. It is a picturesque little 
town perilously perched on the side of a mountain, and 
looking as if it might at any moment slide into the har- 
bor. Just enough trees have been cut down to allow the 
building of the houses, hence the forest encloses the town 
on all sides and clothes the mountains thickly to their very 
tops. The houses are perched on jutting rocks. They are 



38 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

tucked away in all sorts of nooks and corners. The roof 
of one will be on a level with the doorstep of the next. 
Streets turn and twist with an utter disregard of regu- 
larity. In these respects it seems more like a little foreign 
town than an American city. 

A foaming mountain stream with snowy rapids and 
cascades rushes down through the town, and a walk up 
the banks of the stream is one of the events of the time 
spent ashore. The water has the crystalline clearness of 
mountain streams and foams over great boulders and 
mossy logs, and leaps down miniature falls in its eager 
haste to the sea. The banks are green with luxuriant 
shrubbery, wild blackberries, raspberries, salmon berries 
and bushes of many kinds. The ground dogwood stars 
the earth with its snowy blossoms and wild flowers em- 
broider the wooded path with color. Stairways of logs 
all covered with green moss like a velvet carpet lead off to 
homes hidden among the trees. Everywhere is over- 
flowing luxuriance in the vegetation that embanks the 
shining, sparkling water so swiftly rushing by. In the 
thick spruce woods, the note of a thrush comes sweetly 
through the fragrant air and blends with the music of 
the stream. 

This creek is a salmon stream, and, during the run, the 
fish can be seen swarming up its waters and leaping its 
waterfalls on their way to the spawning grounds. 

Nearly all the Alaskan towns along the coast present 
the characteristics of Ketchikan — a cluster of houses 
under overshadowing mountains, planked streets and 
sidewalks, and much of the town built on pilings over the 
water. 

From Ketchikan a number of interesting side trips can 
be made. One is through Rudyerd Bay. which lies back 
of Ketchikan to the east. It is one of the loveliest water- 



Into American Waters 39 

ways of the coast, winding under frowning cliffs in and 
out among islands, with snow mountains, four thousand, 
five thousand, and six thousand feet high, uprearing 
their glistening peaks in the distance. In the centre of the 
bay rises a rock, sheer and precipitous, several hundred 
feet high. 

Another trip is across to Prince of Wales Island where 
is old Kazan with its interesting totem poles, probably 
the greatest number in any one place in Alaska. This 
island is one of the seats of the Hydahs, one of the most 
intelligent and advanced of the Indians of Alaska. 

Opposite Ketchikan, on an island, is an Indian grave- 
yard with totems. 

The steamer is soon threading its way through what is 
known as the Alexander Archipelago, a group of eleven 
hundred islands that have been charted, and innumerable 
smaller ones, mere dots of rock and trees, that are not 
charted. The scene is one of enchantment — placid blue 
waters; wooded shores; steep slopes richly dark with 
spruce and hemlock, with strips of paler green where 
avalanches have swept down, and grass and birch and 
willow have sprung to cover the scar; of great cascades, 
pouring joyously from the mountain tops; of patches of 
snow lingering in the shadows : and always with a great 
amphitheatre of jagged peaks in the far distance making 
a beautiful background of tender, dreamy blue and pure 
white for the richer, deeper coloring at hand. 

Through this land of beauty, the boat quietly gUdes. A 
salmon leaps, shivering the water into a thousand silvery 
ripples. Gulls soar and dip. Wild ducks speed away on 
swiftly fluttering wings. Never is there monotony. The 
channel narrows till its towering green walls seem right 
at hand. It sweeps up to a seemingly impassable granite 
cliff, but the water deftly turns a corner and hurries away 



40 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



into a broad, mountain-surrounded lake. Vistas of 
enchanting waterways stretch in many directions, 
arousing with their tempting beauty the longing to ex- 
plore. The steamer serenely threads its way through this 
maze, knowing its course; though the passengers vainly 
try to guess which passage will be chosen, and usually 
guess the wrong one. Thus, at last, one comes to Wran- 
gell, a town of more than usual interest, though of not 
much size. 

Wrangell is at the mouth of the Stikine River, and 
during the days of the gold rush was the outfitting point 
for those going to the gold fields by way of the Stikine 
River and Lake Teslin. Some went still farther inland to 
the headwaters of the Pelly and down this river to the 
Yukon. Both are hard trails. But the hardships were 
not discovered till the gold seekers had started, and then 
they did not turn back. 

Mines are still being worked up the Stikine River and 
boats of the Hudson Bay Company ply up its waters. 
Even before the rush of '98, mining was done far up the 
river and on the tributaries of the Mackenzie, so that it 
has been a central point for miners for almost half a 
century. 

It was founded by the Russians in 1834, and named 
for Baron Wrangell, the then governor of Alaska. It 
was early an Indian settlement, the principal town of the 
Stikine Indians being Old Wrangell, some distance south 
of the present town. It is claimed that the first carved 
totem poles in Alaska were set up here, and the totem 
poles of Wrangell are among the most famous in the 
Territory, though they are at present in rather a tottering 
and weather-beaten condition. 

The Indian village lies to the south of the town and at 
some distance from the pier. If time permits, a visit is 



Into American Waters 41 

interesting. Here is to be found the Shakes House which 
contains many curios belotiging to the tribe of which 
Chief Shakes, now dead, was merely the custodian. It 
is an interesting place and many of the curios are valu- 
able from an ethnological standpoint. 

At the other end of the town are the remains of the old 
fort built in 1838, used by our government when we took 
over Alaska, and finally abandoned in 1900. Near it are 
the jail, the home of the United States marshal, the post 
office and other government offices. 

This part of the town is very attractive, being on rising 
ground and commanding a view of the beautiful harbor 
with its pretty islands and surrounding mountains. Neat, 
attractive homes are here with pretty flower gardens and 
tempting vegetable patches. 

Many enjoyable side trips can be taken from Wrangell, 
one being to the Le Conte Glacier, and another to the west 
coast of Prince of Wales Island, on which are numerous 
native villages both recent and old. There are also many 
pretty and interesting places merely from the standpoint 
of beautiful scenery that can be reached within easy dis- 
tance of Wrangell. 

One of the most delightful of these excursions into the 
heart of fine scenery is up the Stikine River. Such 
a trip, aside from its scenic interest, has a tinge of the 
romantic in that one is following the trail of the gold 
seekers and also one of the old Hudson Bay routes. Its 
lower course lies through grassy meadows dotted with 
clumps of spruce and fir. Then it begins to enter the 
mountains and finally sweeps into a magnificent canyon, 
the walls rising to a height here and there of several 
thousand feet. Glaciers hang over the cliffs, descend the 
sides, and push out even to the river itself. Waterfalls 
send their joyous voice and rainbow colors to greet eye 



42 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

and ear. Birds sing ; golden bees flit over miles and miles 
of wild roses, honeysuckle, clover, and countless other 
rich-hued and fragrant blossoms. One can scarcely real- 
ize he is in what he had supposed to be an Arctic region. 
Only the presence of the glaciers and the snow-capped 
mountains bring the thought of Arctic snows, and these 
but temper the air refreshingly, making its gentle touch 
as a draught of cool spring water to the thirsty palate. 



CHAPTER IV 



WRANGELL TO SKAGWAY 



Beautiful Wrangell Narrows. The first glacier. Peters- 
burg. Taku Inlet, its fairy fleet of icebergs and its 
GLACIERS. Juneau. Side trips from Juneau. Lynn Canal. 
Haines, Fort William H. Seward and Skagway. 

The scenery grows more and more beautiful as the 
journey proceeds northward. There is no anti-cHmax. 
In fact, a Canadian admitted that the finest scenery did 
not begin until the American waters were reached. But 
scenery has no nationality. No one can cavil at the 
beauty that lies behind. That it grows more impressive 
is only reason for rejoicing. 

Wrangell Narrow-s are famous for their loveliness. 
They wind in the same alluring fashion as the channels 
already threaded, between high mountain walls clothed 
with spruce and cedar, around great gray bluffs, past innu- 
merable islands. The w^ay is well marked with light- 
houses and buoys, and so devious is the channel that in 
some stretches the guiding posts of various kinds seem 
every few yards and the width between those on each side 
scarcely sufficient for the passage of the boat. 

In some places along the shore are strips of vivid green 
grass before the dense growth of trees begins. The 
waterfalls grow in size and volume, roaring down amidst 
the rocks, disappearing among the trees, flashing out again 
in silver radiance at the water's edge. The mountains 

43 



44 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

become higher, some rising almost ten thousand feet, the 
lower parts, the tender blue of the sky; the upper, great 
snow fields. Range upon range, they soar away into the 
distance, some with sharp peaks like the Matterhorn; 
some with peaks like a great cabin, its roof covered with 
snow, others resembling tents. Over the snowy side of 
one mountain lay what seemed like a trail of enormous 
footprints as if some giant had walked across the moun- 
tain top upon some errand of his world. 

Great flocks of wild ducks fly swiftly over the waters, 
the rhythmical flash of white on their wings adding to the 
charm of the scene. 

The first glacier comes into view, a great majestic river 
of ice sweeping down from the sky. Little icebergs ap- 
pear, tiny, fairy fleets, snow white excepting for a won- 
derful blue at their base. 

One speculates as his gaze rests upon the beauty all 
about, if the gold seekers who travelled this route in the 
days of the rush had so much " gold dust in their eyes," 
as John Muir expresses it, that they were blind to the 
wonders of nature's handiwork. So absorbed were many 
who went through here in the early days with the thought 
of gold that there seemed to be no other interest in life 
worth considering. Muir tells that the natives said of him 
when they saw him intently studying a tree, " What can 
the fellow be up to? I saw him the other day on his 
knees looking at a stump as if he expected to find gold in 
it." They could not realize there are many other kinds 
of gold in the world than the shining metal. 

Petersburg is the next stop on this part of the coast. 
It has a different setting from most of the towns here- 
abouts, having found a level place upon which to dispose 
of itself. It is quite a centre for salmon canneries and 
the shipping of fresh fish, those engaged in this business 



JV ran^i'll S (irroics 



WrangeU to Skagway 45 

getting all the ice they need from the bergs that float in 
the waters hereabouts. 

It is also in the heart of a fisherman's and sportsman's 
paradise. Within a few hours' run by motor boat, the 
sportsman can find bear, deer, and wolves, and, crossing 
the range, can get into the habitat of the mountain sheep, 
moose and caribou. Ducks, geese, grouse, and ptarmigan 
are plentiful and the streams swarm with varieties of 
trout. The Le Conte Glacier, about fifteen miles from 
Petersburg, unlike many of the glaciers of Switzerland, 
can be easily approached. It is one of the most southerly 
live glaciers in the world and huge blocks of ice fall from 
it at intervals, and sail away as majestic icebergs, a sight 
one does not expect to see within such easy reach of the 
centres of civilization. Though the atmosphere is pleas- 
antly cool from its blue ice caves, wild flowers and berries 
grow in profusion all about. 

From Petersburg the steamer soon glides across Fred- 
erick Sound into narrower waters and then sweeps out 
into what seems a great lake blue as the skies above and 
entirely encircled with range upon range of snowy moun- 
tains. It is doubtful if the world has elsewhere a fairer 
scene of its kind. One feels like doubting the evidence of 
his eyes, for it appears incredible that so much sheer 
beauty can exist in one place. 

Vast, tremendous, powerful, the mountains soar tier 
upon tier in a great amphitheatre as far as the gaze can 
reach. From this veritable world of snowy peaks, the 
eye finally turns to the gentler beauty at hand. Right 
ahead lies a big, cone-shaped mountain, robed with spruce 
to its top. It seems an island in the water till the eye dis- 
covers a low, narrow causeway connecting it with the 
mainland. The lower mountains in the foreground that 
sweep up from the short on all sides are green with spruce 



46 Alaska, Our Beautiful NortUand 

and fir. Snowy waterfalls pour down their sides and 
lend the beauty of grace and movement. On, the eye 
wanders to mistily blue bases of farther mountains, and 
still onward, till once again that great, magnificent circlet 
of glittering peaks holds the gaze enthralled. Alaska is 
truly snow girt, but there is nothing bleak or forbidding 
in its aspect. There is only the beauty of majesty. 

Then the steamer sweeps around the green, cone-shaped 
mountain and a magic fleet of icebergs, graceful shells, 
birds, turreted castles, sea horses — fantasies of form 
lovelier than any architect could devise — all turquoise 
and sapphire and amethystine in tint, sails slowly into 
view. Beyond them lies a great wall of blue- white ice, 
and still beyond, a vast sheet of ice reaches back to the 
snowy peaks and the sky. 

The Taku Glacier stretches for a mile and a half across 
the upper end of this Taku Inlet and towers three hundred 
feet high. From this ice wall the bergs break, crashing 
with a roar like thunder and sending waves sometimes 
twenty feet high that set all the other bergs to dancing 
and dipping as if joyously greeting their newborn sister. 
The bergs are a marvellous blue, sometimes opaque like 
great blocks of turquoise, again, a sapphire with crystal 
edges. In some are arches and caverns that repeat in the 
depths within the exquisitely pure azure tones. 

At the head of Taku Inlet one has the rare fortune to 
see both a living and a dead glacier. A short distance 
from the glacier that is moving forward at the rate of ten 
feet a day and from which the bergs break Is a glacier 
that has shown no movement for two hundred years. It 
is gradually receding and in front of it is quite a beach 
with clumps of trees growing. The glacier is covered 
with detritus and looks at first glance like an earthy hill- 
side. At times air holes blow out in this, leaving great, 



Wrangell to Skagway 47 

gaping chasms of fresh ice, and destroying the trees in 
front and raising waves in the Inlet destructive to the fish- 
ing boats plying there. 

To the right of the live glacier, the Taku River flows 
into the Inlet, a stream that rises far back in the moun- 
tains and flows through beautiful scenery to its outlet 
here. 

Reluctantly the steamer turns and glides back past 
the bergs slowly sailing to the sea, past the sentinel, cone- 
shaped mountain, out through the beautiful blue lake with 
its encircling world of white, and turns up the Gastineau 
Channel to Juneau. 

Juneau is situated under the shadow of towering green 
mountains. Indeed so small is the space at the base of 
these two great hills that the wonder is a town was ever 
started there. But like every other Alaskan town, the 
discovery of gold brought people, and with people came 
homes and stores that spread themselves out picturesquely 
at the foot of the two peaks, Mt. Roberts and Mt. Juneau, 
in whose canyons the gold had been found. 

So far, this is the first place visited where Alaska's gold 
is brought impressively to the traveller's attention. It is 
here that the famous Treadwell mines are located, and 
the almost equally famous Alaska-Gastineau and Alaska- 
Juneau mines. Seventy million dollars is a low estimate 
for the output of gold from all the mines about Juneau 
since its discovery in this region. 

There are three groups of mining properties in the im- 
mediate vicinity of Juneau; one, the Alaska- Juneau, 
within the town limits; another, the Alaska-Gastineau, 
about three miles below at Thane; and the third, the 
Treadwell group, across the channel at Treadwell, con- 
nected so closely with the little town of Douglas that the 
two are practically one town. At varying distances from 



48 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Juneau are other mines, but these are the famous three 
that have given this section its reputation as a great gold- 
bearing belt. Tourists have heard so much of the Tread- 
well mines and so little of the others, that as the steamer 
glides up the channel to its dock and the stamp mills of 
Alaska-Juneau and Alaska-Gastineau mines are seen 
clinging desperately to the mountain side, there is often 
much questioning as to what these are or if they are the 
famous Treadwell mines. 

But though the mines at Juneau are apt to excite first 
interest because of their fame and because they are first 
seen as the steamer makes its way up the channel, they are 
by no means all that Juneau has to offer the tourist. The 
town itself is picturesque, for the streets wander whither 
they will and twist and turn in most unexpected fashion. 
Indeed, in the early days, when the place was being laid 
out, one of the residents remarked that it -vvould never 
be necessary to have streets as no one would ever use a 
horse in this part of the world, so, little attention was 
given to the width of streets or to the shape or size of lots. 
But the man was a poor prophet, for to-day not only are 
there many horses but there is also a goodly number of 
automobiles. 

In these early days the miners themselves governed the 
town through what was known as the Miners' Meeting. 
This organization adopted rules and regulations govern- 
ing the location of mining claims and the location of a 
town site. It was at one of these meetings that the name 
of the town was chosen, Harrisburg being first taken for 
Richard Harris, one of the early discoverers of gold in 
this section, and then Rockwell, and finally, its present 
name in honor of Joseph Juneau, who divided with Harris 
the honor of the original discovery. This Miners' Meet- 
ing was also a criminal court, and when two hangings 



Wrangell to Skagway 49 

became necessary, each citizen shared the responsibiUty by 
having his hand on the hangman's rope. 

But these times are passed away and to-day Juneau is a 
city with many stores, some of concrete, with many hotels, 
banks, business places of all kinds, and pretty homes. It 
has a municipal wharf and coal yard. It has a fine water 
supply of ice-cold spring water brought down from the 
mountains, a public library, a fine High School, modern in 
every way even to a big electric range for its domestic 
science department; many churches, and all that goes 
to make up comfortable and pleasant living. For it must 
be remembered that Juneau is not only the centre of 
great mining and fishing industries which bring much 
business to its doors, but it is the capital of the Territory 
of Alaska and here are centred not only the headquarters 
of the territorial government but many of the federal 
offices as well. In 1899, Congress passed an Act by which 
the various branches of the government were to be estab- 
lished here when suitable buildings could be secured, and 
the offices of the Governor and Surveyor-General were 
moved from Sitka in 1907. 

All these things insure for Juneau a stable future. The 
large mining projects mean the investment here of mil- 
lions of dollars of capital and the employment of many 
thousands of men. This means the distribution of a 
large amount of money in the way of wages, a large per- 
manent population to be supplied, and, consequently, good 
business. There are also other big industrial projects 
either completed or under way. More than six million 
dollars have been expended within a few years recently 
within four miles of Juneau for development and building 
purposes. So that this Alaskan town feels that it has a 
bright future. 

In addition to the charms of the town itself, there are 



50 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

many interesting side trips about Juneau. Indeed, the 
tourist could most profitably make Juneau headquarters 
for a summer's vacation and find the days filled with out- 
door pleasures that would never pall. 

One of the loveliest of these trips is a ride or walk up 
the beautiful Gold Creek Canyon back of the town to 
Silver Bow Basin at its head. One can go by automobile, 
and it is a delightful ride, or one can pack a lunch, add to 
it for dessert the wild berries that grow plentifully by the 
roadside, and enjoy one of the most exhilarating days 
outdoors he is ever likely to write on his calendar. It is 
about four miles to the head of the canyon, a good road all 
the way, and if a day is taken for the trip, even the one 
least accustomed to walking can accomplish the expedi- 
tion without injurious fatigue. 

Here and there the road is built of planking out over 
the canyon. Below rushes Gold Creek, a foaming, moun- 
tain torrent. Great waterfalls leap and tumble down the 
sides of the enclosing mountains which tower at some 
points several thousand feet. The road at times clings 
close to the granite side of the mountain, with the can- 
yon walls dropping sheer below hundreds of feet. At 
other times it winds through lanes of greenery, the shrubs 
and willows and wild flowers reaching far above one's 
head. Wild flowers are everywhere, a constant succes- 
sion of rich bloom, rose and gold and purple and blue. 
Wild berries are plentiful, big, luscious, salmon berries, 
delicious raspberries ; tempting blackberries, according to 
the season. Over the cliff -like walls of the canyon arches 
a wonderously blue sky, and the air that softly brushes the 
cheek has the refreshing coolness of mountain snows and 
the spicy fragrance of spruce and fir. 

A climb to the top of Mt. Roberts or Mt. Juneau gives 
entrancing views. Over the top of Mt. Jumbo on Doug- 



Wrangell to Skagway 51 

las Island can be seen the mountains on the island beyond 
and the waters of Chatham Strait and Stephens Passage. 
To the north rise the snowy Chilkat Mountains, and east- 
ward, the mountains roll in great, upheaved masses to the 
Canadian border. 

A trip that is not likely to be equalled elsewhere in the 
world is a motor ride to Mendenhall Glacier. Through a 
world all glorious with the rosy hue of fireweed, the blue 
of lupine, the fluffy white of Alaska cotton and the 
frosty sheen of silver spruce, one rides straight into the 
heart of a great mountain of blue-white ice. In fretted 
towers and castles and minarets, in caverns and crevasses, 
its front wall rises sheer a hundred feet and more, in 
tones of delicately clear, tender blue, and rolls back in 
frozen, choppy waves to where great jagged, gray peaks 
against the sky line form the doorway through which it 
pours from invisible mountains beyond. From its front 
flows a swift, glacial river, and here on the great boulders 
at the edge of the stream and backed by the glacier stands 
the Nugget Creek Power House, a place of shining bright- 
ness and order, of noiseless, swiftly revolving wheels, of 
intricate mechanism as wonderful in its way of making 
and sending light and power to the mines many miles 
away as is the great, silent glacier in its making of conti- 
nents. 

This glacier, though similar to Alpine ice streams, is 
larger than the greatest of the Swiss glaciers. It is more 
than twenty-five miles in length as compared with the 
sixteen miles of the Aletsch Glacier, the greatest ice river 
of the Swiss Alps. The mountains at the head of the 
Mendenhall Glacier have an elevation of about seven thou- 
sand feet and offer Alpine climbing that will require the 
ice axe and the iron shod boots of the mountaineer. 

On the way to the glacier, you may be privileged to 



52 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

stop at a little ranch hidden in the birch and spruce woods 
where a smiling Indian woman will show you her flocks 
of white Leghorn chickens, thousands of them, that cover 
the ground like snow, and also her thrifty garden where 
big luscious strawberries gleam tantalizingly under their 
green leaves, and peas, potatoes, cabbage, carrots, and 
many other thriving vegetables may convert you as to the 
possibilities of farming in Alaska. A head of cauHflower 
ten and a half inches high and weighing six pounds was 
raised here, and it was only an average one in a poor sea- 
son. You can see the photograph of it taken with the 
measuring rule alongside, if the tale seems incredible. 
Another product of this garden was a turnip weighing 
twenty-one pounds. In the little patch of strawberries 
thirty by forty feet were picked twenty-two gallons of the 
fruit besides what was used by the family. 

Another beautiful ride is out the road to Auk Lake. 
It leads along the upper end of Gastineau Channel, with 
its blue waters on one side, spruce and fir woods on the 
other, and snow mountains in the distance. It sweeps out 
into grassy meadows with lupines and fireweed and golden 
daisies adding to the loveliness of the scene, over rapid 
glacial streams, through woods with vegetation tropical 
in its luxuriance. 

Once a week there is usually a trip by boat up the Taku 
River and into the Lake Atlin country. This takes the 
traveller once again into that glorious Taku inlet with its 
fairy fleet of icebergs, its encircling snow mountains, its 
glaciers, and then on up the Taku River through towering 
canyon walls and out upon the shores of one of the most 
beautiful mountain lakes in the world. 

There are launch trips through the beautiful intricate 
waterways to Sitka, to Glacier Bay and the Muir Glacier 
to which the big steamers do not go. In fact one can put 



Icebergs in Taku Inlet 



Wrangell to Skagway 53 

in many days at Juneau, with every day filled with beauty 
from nature's hand. 

But the tourist who is journeying northward by 
steamer can see but little more than the town, for the 
steamer whistle blows, "All aboard," is shouted, and the 
trip is again resumed. As the Gastineau Channel at its up- 
per end is too shallow to permit the passage of steamers, 
though it is being dredged and in time vessels will pass 
out this way, the steamer now retraces its route down the 
Gastineau Channel and then turns northward into L}'nn 
Canal. 

Lynn Canal, named by Vancouver for his birthplace in 
England, is another scene of enchantment. The sheer 
beauty of it makes one wonder if it really is of this earth. 
For sixty miles it extends in almost a straight line north, 
a placid sheet of blue water walled in on both sides with 
snow-capped mountains that rise almost sheer from the 
water's edge to a height in many places of six thousand 
feet. Peak upon peak they range, their bases mistily 
blue, their tops shining with their snowy burden, and with 
snow in patches in the crevasses on their sides. Water- 
falls rush down their steep declivities, and glacier after 
glacier sweeps from the sky line down through ravine and 
gorge, often as many as a dozen of these great ice rivers 
being seen at one time. The Davidson Glacier, one of the 
most noted, spreads its great ice wall, almost three miles 
wide, near the water's edge. 

It is a scene of unparalleled grandeur — the shining 
water, the shining snow caps stretching mile upon mile 
into the far distance, the misty blue of their lower slopes, 
the deep sombre green of spruce and fir at the water's 
edge, the foaming waterfalls, the majestic silent rivers of 
ice strong with the strength that makes and moulds con- 
tinents. For hours upon hours, the steamer glides through 



54 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

this wonderland, the fiord growing narrower, picturesque 
lighthouses and islands appearing as the upper end draws 
near. On the west shore, near the upper end, are Haines 
and Fort William Henry Seward. 

Haines and Fort Seward are practically one, a little 
stretch of spruce woods between the two being the only 
separation. Haines is an attractive looking town and has 
quite a number of two-story buildings all neatly painted. 
The presence of paint is as noticeable here as is the ab- 
sence of it elsewhere. A long wharf leads from the dock 
back to the main street of the town which climbs upward 
to the homes, hotels and stores of the little village. On 
the creeks back of Haines are mines and in the valleys 
thereabouts, farms. It is one of the best places in Alaska 
for certain agricultural products, notably strawberries, 
and its nearness to Juneau and the possibility even of 
sending its products to Seattle promise it quite an agri- 
cultural future. At one time there was talk of a railroad 
from Haines to the copper and other mineralized regions 
at the headwaters of the White River. With the develop- 
ment of the Territory undoubtedly this road will come, 
open up a rich section, and probably be extended to Fair- 
banks, bringing to this interior town even quicker commu- 
nication with the States than by the government railroad, 
and enabling the people of Fairbanks to enjoy such fruits 
and other products of the outside as are too perishable to 
be shipped by the longer route. 

Fort Seward has the neat, orderly air of all military 
posts. 

It is but a few hours' run to Skagway and here one 
feels that he comes more intimately in touch than he has 
elsewhere with the trail of that gold-crazed mob that 
poured in '97 and '98 from Seattle northward in a wild 
race for Dawson. 



CHAPTER V 

SKAGWAY AND THE WHITE PASS 

SXAGWAY PRESENT AND PAST. SOAPY SmITH AND HIS GANG. ThE 
AWE-INSPIRING SCENERY OF THE CANYON. ThE TRAIL OF THE 
STAMPEDERS AND ITS TRAGIC STORY. ThE BUILDING OF THE 
RAILROAD THAT CONQUERED THE PASS. BEAUTIFUL LaKE 

Bennett. 

Skagway is, to-day, a quiet little town of pretty- 
homes and grass-grown streets. Its tranquil likeness, ex- 
cept perhaps for the curio stores with their bearskins, 
nuggets and carved ivories, can be found in many an 
Eastern or Middle-West State. To one who gazes upon 
it for the first time, without knowing its history, would 
come no inkling of the turbulent tide of humanity that 
poured through its streets in '97 and "98 nor of the trag- 
edies and comedies enacted there. 

Though situated against a background of mountains, 
as are most of the Alaskan ports, Skagway has quite a 
flat little valley in which to spread itself. One finds here 
streets of good Mother Earth instead of the planking al- 
most universal elsewhere. The streets run at right angles 
to each other and are clean and well kept. The houses sit 
back in pretty yards, and everywhere are flowers, for 
Skagway has been called the flower city of Alaska. It is 
no unusual thing to find dahlias ten inches in diameter and 
sweet peas nine feet high. Other flowers grow with equal 
luxuriance, a vegetation that is a source of amazement 
to those who still think of Alaska as a region of ice and 
barrenness. 

55 



56 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Skagway has stores, hotels, churches, electric lights, 
telephones, a good high school with manual training, 
domestic science and a well-equipped gymnasium, and all 
the other comforts of a modern though small town. It 
has several fraternal organizations and is the home of the 
first camp of the Arctic Brotherhood. This society was 
founded here by the American and British residents for 
protection against law-breakers, its motto being, " No 
boundary line here." It developed into a fraternal and 
social order with branches scattered well over Alaska. 

Round about Skagway are many pleasant places for 
side trips. Mt. Dewey, that rears its white head nearby, 
offers a good stiff climb to the hardy mountaineer. From 
its top a beautiful view is obtained of Skagway lying like 
a checkerboard below, of the silvery line of Lynn Canal, 
of the green canyon stretching off in the opposite direc- 
tion, of the railroad winding through it, and of the moun- 
tains opposite. 

Denver Glacier makes another interesting trip. It can 
be reached by a trail, or by the train part way and then by 
a walk. The A B Mountain, so called because of the 
deep clefts in its side which, when filled with snow, look 
like the letters A B, tempts some to essay its rugged 
heights. There are walks and waterfalls and little moun- 
tain lakes that all make pleasant outings, and across the 
Inlet Is the site of Dyea which, in 1891, could claim but 
one house, but which, like Skagway, grew almost over 
night with the coming of the gold seekers. Dyea was the 
starting point of the Chilkoot Pass, that stralght-up-to- 
the-sky climb of thirty-five hundred feet, that led 
over the mountains Into the Interior. Skagway's 
passage to the gold fields was up through the White Pass. 
Rumors of this lower pass had been floating about for 
some time but so eager was each one to get to the gold 



Skagway and the White Pass 57 

fields that no one would definitely explore it. Some years 
before, Mr. William Ogilvie, a surveyor in charge of one 
of the expeditions that had to do with the boundary ques- 
tion, had heard of a lower pass than the Chilkoot and had 
sent a member of his party to try to discover it. The 
Indians who, without doubt, knew of this cut through the 
mountains were extremely reluctant to lend any assistance 
but finally one was induced to go. The pass was found 
and named by Mr. Ogilvie " White Pass " in honor of 
Thomas White, Canadian Minister of the Interior. But 
at the time of Ogilvie's discovery there were few but 
Indians in the country and so news of it remained practi- 
cally unknown until the hardships of the Chilkoot trail 
in the days of the gold rush revived the gossip about it. 

The Chilkoot route crosses a flat bit of land, thence up 
the Dyea River, across the moraine of a glacier and then 
to the summit by a climb so steep it was often necessary 
to pull one's self up by branches of trees or anything that 
could be laid hold of. The White Pass was supposed to 
be easier, but when both passes had become fairly well 
known opinion was divided as to which was the better. 

There are several quaint Indian legends as to the name 
of the town Skagway. Its site at the foot of the cleft 
through the mountains is subject at times to the descent 
of a strong north wind. This, it is said, is the one un- 
pleasant feature of life in Skagway. The imagination of 
the Indians who of course suffered from it before the 
white men came, wove about it, as is their custom, a fanci- 
ful interpretation, and so they tell of a beautiful Indian 
maiden who appeared in the Indian settlement at this 
point and who was adopted by the tribe and given the 
name of Skugua. A brave Indian youth — Indian re- 
porters use the same license in their descriptions as do 
their white brethren, for the maidens are always beauti- 



58 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

f ul and the youths always brave — fell in love with her. 
But the course of true love runs no more smoothly in an 
Indian village than elsewhere and the two quarrelled. 
Skugua fled up the mountain pursued by her lover, and 
eventually, by the whole village. But she was fleet of foot, 
and must have been strong of wind, for she outdistanced 
them, and, at the summit, she disappeared in the moun- 
tains and was never seen in the flesh again. 

Her lover mourned so sincerely that she finally ap- 
peared to him in a dream and told him that if he would 
honor her memory and if the Indians would let no 
stranger come, she would watch over him and them. 

It is well known that the Indians guarded the secret of 
the Pass for many years, and that when the bitter north 
wind swept down through it, they would exclaim, " Oh, 
Skugua, have mercy upon us," and that when the ava- 
lanche took place on the Chilkoot trail that buried many, 
they said, " Skugua is enraged." 

But Skagway has far more than legend to draw upon 
for its romance. Its placid face to-day gives no hint of 
the passions of its youth, of the ambition, the hope, the 
despair, the greed, the cruelty, the fierce hate, that once 
filled its streets. As many as thirty thousand people 
came here during the gold rush, eagerly asking questions 
as to conditions to be met on the Pass, feverishly making 
ready their supplies for the trip, or serving, in some capac- 
ity, those going, or preying upon them. The distraught 
confusion and hurry of those days is illustrated by the 
unloading of one of the boats from Seattle as told by a 
man on board. " The passengers and their goods were 
put on a scow to be sent ashore. Before the scow got to 
land, it stuck on a mud flat. The people threw their 
things over in the wet mud, clambered off, and started to 
pack their goods to the beach. I saw by the high water 



Skagway and the White Pass 59 

mark on the rocks that when the tide turned we would be 
floated in, and I tried to restrain some of the men from 
the fatiguing and useless work they w^ere doing. But 
nothing would stop them. Before they got their goods 
ashore, the tide began to flow back and many had their 
supplies ruined. But, even then, they continued to w^ade 
through the mud and water with their loads on their back 
instead of putting the things on the scow^ and waiting." 

Another instance of the mob mesmerism that ruled is 
shown by the fact that when news came to Dyea of an 
easier route over the mountains, fifteen thousand people 
left the town and started pell mell for Skagway without 
waiting to see if the report were true. 

A character of these days that looms unpleasantly in 
Skagway's history is Soapy Smith. One cannot walk 
the streets of Skagway to-day without hearing of his 
exploits or seeing his picture on postcards for sale. But 
he was not a resident of whom Skagway is proud, and 
the wonder to-day is that he so long dominated the town 
or that his exploits should even yet hold the place they do 
in the public mind. 

He is described by residents of Skagway who still 
remember him as an afl^able gentleman, " very much like a 
minister," which leads one to ponder just which way the 
barb of this remark is pointed. That he was suave and 
pleasant in manner, however, all agree, and photographs 
of him show a kindliness about the eyes and a gracious- 
ness of expression that one does not associate with a crim- 
inal of his type. It may have been with him a gratifica- 
tion of vanity to so easily get the better of his fellow men 
rather than any real pleasure in the crimes themselves that 
was the incentive of his conduct. 

He had received the name " Soapy " because of his 
facility in less prosperous days of seemingly tucking a 



60 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

five dollar bill in a cake of soap which, of course, was 
minus the five dollars when the exultant purchaser un- 
wrapped it. 

In Skagway, however, he performed no such common- 
place tricks. He controlled a gang of men who robbed, 
murdered even, at his bidding. Soapy or a member of his 
gang would get acquainted with those going in who 
looked as if they had funds, or with miners bound for 
the States who were injudicious enough to boast of their 
poke. They would be invited to the Information Bureau 
he conducted, to saloons he controlled, or to any place 
where they could be robbed. It was no unusual thing for 
seven or eight men at a time to be piled unconscious in a 
heap in a shed or secluded yard back of a saloon or 
gambling place run by the gang. 

Though it was known that he was the head and ruling 
power of this lawlessness, the fact was winked at by the 
citizens of the town. He was marshal of the day on the 
Fourth of July, four days before he was shot. And the 
story is told that a clergyman of the place wishing to 
get subscriptions for some church work came to him for 
help. Soapy readily promised his assistance, gave a large 
sum himself, and urged others to do so. From time to 
time, he asked the young clergyman how much he had 
secured and what he was doing with it. When the sum 
had reached a satisfactory size, he sent one of his men to 
steal it. 

The depredations of the gang were giving Skagway 
such a bad name that the town was losing business. 
People were going to or returning from the interior by 
other routes, fearing they would be robbed of all they 
possessed if they ventured here. Some of the citizens de- 
cided an end must be put to this lawlessness and organ- 
ized a Vigilance Committee and endeavored to oust the 



Skagway and the White Pass 61 

band. But Soapy's influence was too strong for them and 
the effort was abandoned. The robbery of a miner, how- 
ever, and his persistent efforts for redress finally brought 
the matter to a head. The Vigilance Committee gathered 
itself together again and decided something must be 
done. Word was passed privately about that a meeting 
would be held to discuss the situation. As there was no 
hall in the town large enough, the people gathered in the 
early evening on one of the long wharves that jutted far 
out into the water. Frank Reed was placed at the en- 
trance to prevent any of Soapy's gang from joining the 
crowd and hearing the plans. 

Soapy, of course, was soon informed of the affair. 
Those who knew him said he must have been slightly in- 
toxicated or he would not have undertaken what he did. 
But, getting his gun, he started for the wharf, boasting, 
" I'll soon end this." Reed challenged him and told him 
he could not go out upon the wharf. " You can't stop 
me," was Soapy's reply, and raised his gun. Both men 
fired. Smith was killed instantly, and Reed, mortally 
wounded, lingered for about two weeks and then passed 
away. 

Under the trees of a little cemetery up the canyon, the 
bodies of both men lie. Over Soapy Smith's grave is a 
simple headstone with the words : 

Jefferson R. Smith, 

Died July 8, 1898 

Aged 38 years 

Over Reed's body is a beautiful granite shaft on which 
is lettered : 

Frank H. Reed, 

Died July 20, 1898 

He gave his life for the honor of Skagway. 



62 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

With the death of Smith, the gang scattered. *' They 
jumped Hke jack rabbits for the hills," said a resident of 
Skagway, in speaking of that night. None of his men 
thought of him. His body lay on the wharf till two 
o'clock in the morning when some women took it away. 
But his men were flying from Skagway by any trail and 
by no trail. A messenger was despatched to the summit 
to let none pass. Citizens formed themselves into posses 
and searched. About fifteen were captured. There was 
talk of lynching. One, known as Slim Jim, who had been 
confined over a meat shop and had escaped, came near 
meeting his fate upon his recapture. Cowboys in the 
crowd who had secured some rope constantly twirled 
their lariats, and if the noose had fallen over his head, 
such was the temper of the crowd, nothing could have 
saved him. But the better element who wanted no more 
discredit to attach to Skagway, would leap as the rope 
circled, catch it, and prevent its fall, till finally hot tem- 
pers cooled and the crowd dispersed. 

The prisoners were taken to Juneau, tried, and given 
various sentences, and Skagway entered upon a life of 
law and respectability. 

Many of the relics of these early days, including 
Soapy's gambling outfit, are now owned by Mrs. Harriet 
Pullen who has, in fact, quite a museum of interesting 
curios, and is as well a graphic portrayer of these excit- 
ing times. She came with the rush of these early days, 
landing on the beach with four small children and seven 
dollars. To-day, she has the most unique, most delightful 
and most modern hotel to be found in Alaska, a place that 
has entertained more distinguished men and women than 
any other hostelry in the Territory. Indeed, one of the 
most interesting parts of the many interesting things she 
has gathered are the photographs of her distinguished 



Skagway and the White Pass 63 

guests with their autographs. Among them are Earl Grey, 
" Uncle " Joe Cannon, Governor Riggs, the members of 
the Alaska Engineering Commission, Dr. Leonard Sug- 
don, the noted Alaskan lecturer, the members of Alaska's 
first legislative assembly, James Sheakley, one of the 
early governors of Alaska, and dozens of others. For 
the entertainment of her distinguished guests at the ban- 
quets given in their honor by the city of Skagway, she 
has a specially designed service of Haviland china that 
can serve one hundred and fifty people and special solid 
silver tableware. 

One can scarcely expect such things in Alaska, yet this 
is but in keeping with the house she has planned. A num- 
ber of charming bungalows surround the main building 
where families or parties of friends can live as privately 
as in their own home while sojourning with her. Almost 
every room in her establishment has its bath. One of 
the unique features of her table is that the fresh milk 
which comes from her own ranch is served in small, 
dainty, blue-enamelled pans to each guest and he can 
skim his own cream for his coffee and cereal. 

In her museum are valuable Indian relics, for she 
speaks five Indian languages and she has been taken in 
as a member by several tribes; curious hand-hammered 
copper and brass vessels from the Russian occupancy at 
Sitka; silver candlesticks from Baranof's castle; carved 
ivories; wonderful strings of beads, some hand cut and 
more than a hundred years old. Hours can be spent 
delighting in these odd and rare and beautiful things 
associated with the life and early history of Alaska. 

All this is the outgrowth of this remarkable woman's 
initiative, originality and resourcefulness, and to hear 
her tell of the years that have passed since she landed 
on the beach, widowed, and with her little brood and her 



64 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

slim purse, is like turning the pages of a romance. She 
first drove a four-horse team up the Pass to White Pass 
City and freighted in goods to the stampeders. She 
worked all day in this strenuous fashion, and baked apple 
pies that soon became famous, almost all night. In this 
way she got the start that has fruited so splendidly to-day 
in this progressive and beautiful establishment that is the 
pride of Skagway. No one considers a visit to Skagway 
complete without meeting Mrs. Pullen, seeing her estab- 
lishment and hearing her graphic stories of early days. 
The monument she has erected and all it signifies is as 
much a part of Alaska as the scenery. 

Skagway is another point one could delightfully make 
headquarters for a summer holiday, as there are many 
points of interest in the neighborhood to enjoy. 

At Skagway begins the White Pass and Yukon rail- 
road, one of the most remarkable feats of railroad con- 
struction in the country. It has conquered the seemingly 
unconquerable, for the canyon that lies ahead in its 
frowning, almost perpendicular walls and its roaring 
mountain torrent seems secure in its primeval wildness 
and ruggedness against all efforts to subdue it. 

When a railroad was first projected up the pass, the 
idea was laughed at. " You need a balloon, not a rail- 
road. This is a job for an aeronaut, not for an engineer," 
was the answer of many to the group of men determined 
to put the project through. But they persevered, as 
Alaskans usually do, and to-day the road is an actuality. 
The departure of the train is a friendly affair. It runs 
out Broadway, the main street of the town, and people 
on the sidewalk wave farewells and shout messages to 
those on the cars, a survival perhaps of the old-time leave- 
taking when men fared forth with packs on their backs 
and friends wished them good luck. 



Skagway and the White Pass 65 

Past the high school, over a meandering httle stream 
with neat, stone coping and golden marsh marigolds shin- 
ing against the gray of the wall and the green of the 
grass, across the Skagway River and through groves of 
spicy, fragrant balsam-poplar, the train speeds. The can- 
yon looms ahead, but of its terrific, awe-inspiring gran- 
deur no hint is yet given, all is so gentle and beautiful and 
bright in the outskirts of this little town. 

But soon the climb begins. The tree tops drop below 
the eye — a sea of green through which the river wanders. 
Gorge after gorge opens, to right, to left, before, behind, 
— narrow, walled-in, far-reaching spaces, blocked with 
snow mountains in the distance. Back down the canyon 
the eye follows the windings of the Skagway River and 
out over the blue Lynn Canal to the snowy range across 
the water. 

But the walls of the canyon begin to close, shutting 
out all but their own grim, inaccessible sides. The river 
roars below looking as if it would tear the very founda- 
tions of the earth away with its mad strength. Across 
its seething waters a faint trail is occasionally seen wind- 
ing over the upended boulders, among the tangled bushes, 
along precipitous slopes. One wonders how the stam- 
peders ever made their way for scarcely a secure foot- 
hold can be seen. Sheer desperation must have goaded 
them on. Courage itself would fail before such barriers. 
When this trail is seen, it is easy to realize why the song 
of the little golden-crowned sparrow that flits among the 
bushes was said to be, " I'm so weary," and why the bird 
was called, " Weary Willie." The gold seekers were 
hearing in its voice their own feelings. 

Up and up the panting engine climbs. Alaska does 
everything on a big scale and she begins her tremendous- 
ness right here at her threshold. No putting of words 



66 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

together can describe the terrible, awe-inspiring beauty of 
this canyon. Terraces of bare rock rise steeply one above 
another. Bare, jagged peaks tower sharply against the 
blue sky, too sheer even for snow to lie upon them. Now 
and then, the old trail shows itself, worn like an old door- 
sill into the bare rocks by the tread of many feet. Every 
little while a slender, weather-beaten stick held up by a 
little pile of stones tells of one who found the struggle 
too great and lay down by the trail and died. The next 
comer mercifully covered the body as best he could, stuck 
up the willow wand to tell the tragedy, and went on. Far 
down in the canyon can still be seen a few tumbledown 
shacks, all that remains of White Pass City, the first 
stopping place in the days of the stampeders. From here 
to the summit is Dead Horse Gulch where three thousand 
horses and mules died in three years. 

But the tragedies of the past are forgotten in the 
glories of the present. One seems to be riding on the 
crest of the world. Back down the gorge, one looks 
straight for a distance of twelve miles and sees Skagway 
nestling at its mouth, Lynn Canal beyond, and against the 
sky line the mistily blue, snow-capped mountains. Across 
the canyon, a great waterfall leaps down three thousand 
feet in a series of foaming cascades. Bare, bleak peaks 
cleave the sky, great sheets of snow in their gorges. Cling- 
ing close to the side of the mountain, a thousand feet in 
the air, the road winds around the head of a tremendous 
gorge, going eight miles to achieve one. Torrential 
streams pour down the sides. The snow-white expanse 
of glaciers comes into view. Mountain peaks rear their 
heads over other mountain peaks, a great, jumbled world 
of uplifted snowy crests. Carefully the train winds on- 
ward over ravine and gulches that leave one gasping and 
dizzy at what does not lie beneath. The river is lost from 






'^%:^'^^^ 










ymP 







Skagway and the White Pass 67 

sight so far does it roll below. A tunnel yawns and the 
train shoots into darkness, and then out again into the 
wonderful panorama of mountain top and vast dizzy 
depths. Over a great cantilever bridge, the farthest north 
bridge of its kind in the world, that spans with its inter- 
laced network of steel a mighty ravine two hundred and 
fifteen feet high, past perpendicular rocks like sentinel 
gateways where the river has broken through, on, breath- 
lessly up and up into a world of ever increasing wildness 
and grandeur, the train climbs, and then at last out into a 
level breathing space, White Pass, and the canyon has 
been conquered. 

Up and around and through it toiled twenty years ago 
the gold seekers, often with the temperature far below 
zero. Admiration for them grows and one can under- 
stand why those little slender sticks drooping over their 
pile of stones are sometimes less than a yard apart. 

The task of building such a road can scarcely be im- 
agined. But the work went forward summer and win- 
ter. When there seemed no way at all to locate the grade, 
men were let down with ropes from the heights above. 
When great drifts of snow blocked the way, they were 
shovelled off. No obstacle was too great to be sur- 
mounted, the spirit one finds throughout the Territory. 
In the summer, shifts of men worked day and night. One 
of the men who had the task in charge said that at one 
time when conditions were especially serious he never 
sat down for two days and nights. 

At the summit, where one of the construction camps 
was located, the ice festoons that formed in the dining 
tent in winter from the steam of the near-by cooking had 
to be swept down previous to each meal, and then would 
often form again before the meal was over and drop 
pieces of ice down the backs of those eating. The men 



68 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

ate with coats, hats and gloves on, so cold was it. But 
they were enthusiastic workers, for the bigness of the 
undertaking had hold of them and discomfort weighed 
little. 

The base of supplies was a thousand or so miles away, 
for everything had to be brought from Seattle or Van- 
couver. There were no connecting telegraph lines in case 
extra or unusual supplies were needed. The sailing of 
steamers was uncertain. Tremendous quantities of sup- 
plies were necessary. In one place a cliff one hundred and 
twenty feet high and seventy feet thick had to be blasted 
and required a large amount of powder. Not only did 
all these things have to be brought from the States, but 
after arrival at Skagway, they had to be packed up the 
trail to where the men were at work. 

Fortunately, the workers were an unusually intelligent 
class of men, for many of them were the gold seekers who 
were glad to work in winter while waiting for navigation 
to open into the interior. Others needed to replenish 
their capital and found this a good opportunity. To be 
sure, this good fortune had its disadvantages, for when 
news came of the strike at Atlin, fifteen hundred of them 
threw down their picks and shovels, drew their pay, and 
started pell mell for the gold fields. 

At White Pass, the summit, British territory is entered, 
and the Stars and Stripes and the Union Jack fly side 
bv side. It is a world of bare rocks and mountains among 
which lies a little slender lake, great in importance though 
small in size. For this, it is claimed by many, is the real 
source of the Yukon River, which rising thus only about 
twenty miles from the ocean yet sends its waters more 
than two thousand miles to reach it. 

The Yukon River somewhat resembles Homer in that 
many places claim its birth. Summit Lake has its advo- 



Skagway and the White Pass 69 

cates. Atlin Lake makes insistent claim. Pelly River 
raises its voice, and so the tale goes. But all are contrib- 
uting, and if the Yukon itself could speak, it would, no 
doubt, point to the fact that on its broad bosom flash the 
waters from all three and more. 

The road now winds by lakelets and streams with snow 
mountains guarding the horizon. Clumps of dwarf 
spruce, low willows, blue lupines, and other wild flowers 
make the scene one of gentle beauty and rich color. Little 
grassy swamps, while adding to the beauty of the picture, 
must also have added to the trials of the stampeders, and 
the tale of the willow wands continues. It is, no doubt, 
these tales of hardship in the early days that still linger in 
memory and make Alaska seem an inaccessible place. But 
one rides to-day in comfortable observation cars with ex- 
cellent meals provided en route and everything done that 
can be thought of by courteous officials for the full en- 
joyment of the trip. The hardships of the early days are 
now only a memory that add for the traveller of to-day 
a romantic interest to the route. And he can enjoy 
what undoubtedly these pioneers could not, some of the 
wildest and most stupendous mountain scenery the world 
knows. 

Various small stations are passed ; one. Log Cabin, was 
a favorite stopping place with the gold seekers, and in 
those days boasted a good-sized hotel. At one place is a 
well-filled cemetery. It is said that every man buried 
here died with his boots on. 

Soon Lake Bennett, named for James Gordon Bennett, 
is reached, and the road winds along the shores of this 
entrancing sheet of water for twenty-eight miles. Blue 
and green and violet it stretches, a wondrous shimmering 
sheet of varying color. At times the mountains close in, 
their snowy peaks reflected in its placid waters. Again 



70 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

the higher peaks sweep away until they become soft blue 
outlines in the distance, and near at hand low hills rise, 
some a soft rich red, thus adding still another lovely hue 
to the wonderful coloring of the scene. The air is sweet 
with the spicy pungence of the balsam-poplar and the 
breath of the wild flowers that fringe the road with a 
border of blue and gold and rose. After the wild, grip- 
ping grandeur of the canyon, this scene with its gentle 
shore lines, its dainty flowers, its lovely colors, its pure, 
clear reflections is refreshingly restful. 

But though so gentle in its beauty, this part of the 
road was one of the costliest to construct. Almost every 
foot of the twenty-eight miles had to be blasted from solid 
rock. 

If weird figures loom in the distance, one need not won- 
der if, like Rip Van Winkle, he has entered a mountain 
region of gnomes and imps. Two such figures seen far 
down the track, one apparently bearded like a pard, and 
with black hair falling to his waist, the other a good imi- 
tation of Father Time, turned out to be merely men wear- 
ing the fashionable Alaskan headdress, a mosquito net, 
one net being black, the other, white. These nets are a 
good protection during the mosquito season, which lasts, 
it is said, until the middle of July. They consist of a 
length of fine mosquito mesh or veiling, falling to the 
shoulders with a gathering string at the top to hold it 
about the hat, another at the bottom to keep it snug about 
the chest, and a light wire or boning in the centre to hold 
it out from the face. All sorts of fancy nets and masks 
are sold, but this style is the simplest and most comfort- 
able. Those who are merely travelling through Alaska 
however, are not likely to need them. They are only re- 
quired by those who expect to spend days in the open, 
and even then some people do not find the mosquitoes 



Skagway and the White Pass 71 

annoying. Upon a camping trip in this section, no one 
had occasion to use nets. 

At the farther end of Lake Bennett is Carcross, or as 
the Indians have poetically termed it, Caribou Crossing, 
because of the great herds of caribou that at one time 
crossed here. It is said that they were so numerous that 
their horns looked like a forest. It took them two months 
to pass. 

The place is but a handful of small houses, mostly log 
cabins, erected here and there on a patch of sand made 
bright by clusters of wild forget-me-not and baby blue 
eyes. But the primitiveness of the town is lost sight of 
in the beauty of its location, for the blue waters of the 
lake spread before it and snow mountains encircle the 
horizon. At some little distance from the village is a 
native school and also a fox farm, the first to be encoun- 
tered of this new industry that is springing up in the 
Northland. 

The principal interest of Carcross however, lies in the 
fact that it is the starting point for one of the most beau- 
tiful lake and mountain trips of all this region. 



CHAPTER VI 



BEAUTIFUL LAKE ATLIN 



The unique trip to the little town of Atlin and its flower- 
jewelled STREETS. Motoring to the mines. Camping at 
Llewellyn Glacier. The beauty of this great river of 
ice and of the scenery about it. 

Though not in Alaska geographically speaking, the 
trip to Atlin which begins here at Carcross is part of an 
Alaskan itinerary and is taken by almost every tourist to 
the Northland, so well known has this lake become for its 
unusual attractions. Dawson itself is not in Alaska, yet 
every one who goes to the interior by way of the Yukon 
not only wishes to visit Dawson by reason of its romantic 
history but also perforce must, as there is no other route to 
travel in this part of the country. There is no such com- 
pulsion at Atlin, since Atlin lies ofif the beaten track ; but 
there is the lure of a great mountain lake lying serene 
and placid under the shadow of snow-capped mountains, 
of a great glacier at its farther end, of a sunny, flower- 
jewelled little town, of interesting mining camps, of the 
wild life of primeval woods and great fish leaping in lake 
and stream. For these reasons most of the tourists to 
Alaska go to Atlin and the days passed under the spell 
of its enchantment are among the most delightful of the 
trip to the north. 

A small steamer is taken at Carcross for the journey. 
It is a stern-wheeler and draws very little water, and on 

72 



Beautiful Lake AtUn 73 

it one has the first of the picturesque experiences of a 
steamer journey in the Northland of taking on wood for 
fuel. The boat though small is perfectly appointed, a 
little gem of boatcraft, and it is a pleasure to go over it, 
from the neat, roomy lower deck where the freight and 
the wood are piled, through the clean engine-room with its 
matting and seats like a cosy sitting-room, through the 
immaculate pantries and kitchen, the dining-room with its 
cheery open grate and beautiful wood mosaic over the 
mantel, a bit of artistic work that is justly famed in the 
North, to the comfortable staterooms on the upper deck 
and the big, roomy pilot house with its easy wicker chairs 
where the captain and pilot explain the points of interest 
and tell tales of the early days. 

Into the peaceful waters ahead the boat glides smoothly, 
a slow, gentle breathing being the only indication that the 
engines are at work. Low, green-clad hills rise from the 
shore and throw darkly beautiful reflections in the water. 
Far in the distance soar the encircling snow mountains, 
beginning to be touched with a rosy Alpine glow, for the 
steamers usually leave Carcross late in the afternoon. 
Graceful wooded points reach out into the water. Little 
islands try to block the way. Golden Gate, Squaw Point, 
Seabird Isles, the names run. The water takes on a shim- 
mering silver blue, the mountains a rose, the whole far- 
away end of the lake vista being blocked with their 
glowing peaks. The glow of an Indian campfire shines 
from the bank and the slender lines of a canoe are seen on 
the beach. A golden moon rides aloft, for though it is 
still light, it is ten o'clock and the moon must be about 
its business. 

The boat gently glides up to the shore, a gang plank is 
thrown across to the bank, and sturdy hands are soon 
rattling on the wood in hand trucks from the rows neatly 



74 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

piled at the edge of the water. Passengers go ashore to 
visit the Indian family whose tents and glowing fire make 
a picturesque note on the beach a short distance away. 

An Indian woman, squatted on the ground, is making 
moccasins, and two little Indian children play about An 
Indian man sits by the fire, and under a mosquito canopy 
near by an Indian baby regards the visitors with solemn 
black eyes. On the water dances a little toy boat, and at 
notice of it the old Indian man's face lights with the 
pleasure of a child's. The woods creep close to the little 
encampment at the back, the water laps in front ; but the 
friendly fire, the playing children, the frisking of a puppy 
tied to a log, take away all sense of loneliness. 

The hour draws on to midnight and reluctantly the 
passengers go to bed, for it is not dark and the scene still 
has its beauty of gentle lines and lovely color. 

In the morning the boat is docked at this end of the 
water journey and a small portage is made by train across 
a narrow neck of land to the shore of Lake Atlin. This 
train is unique. It is an observation car in the truest 
sense, for it is a flat freight car, open at one end and with 
canvas top and sides. Birds build their nests in it, and 
it is said that when the young birds are hatched but still 
in their nests, and the train starts, the old birds fly in 
great excitement the length of the trip, not knowing ex- 
actly what is happening to their home and children. 

Atlin Lake stretches for eighty miles, a vision of gran- 
deur not to be equalled elsewhere in the world, say globe 
trotters. In many places, snow mountains rise sheer from 
the water's edge, gray, grim walls so steep nothing can 
grow upon them. Snow lies in patches in their gorges 
and ravines and covers their tops with a shining mantle. 
At other points the slopes are gentler, and spruce and fir, 
birch and willow make a robe of varying shades of green. 



Beautiful Lake Atlin 75 

But always in the background even to these lower hills are 
snow mountains, peak upon peak, not one great, isolated 
crest, but range upon range filling the horizon in every 
direction — snow-capped peaks at hand, snow-capped 
peaks filling in the breaks and gaps between the nearer 
mountains. And when the water is smooth the lake re- 
flects every peak, so clearly outlined, so apparently with- 
out a break, that it is difficult to tell where the one begins 
and the other ends. " Look! Look! " exclaimed a small 
child on one of the boats. " Sheep in the water." The 
passengers gazed in the direction she pointed, saw the 
reflection, and then looking upward beheld the mountain 
sheep on a peak above. 

When the autumn tints turn the mountains to a glory 
of color and the red and gold and russet and green soar to 
the skies and glow in the water below, when all is capped 
off with the shining snow peaks in the heavens and in the 
waves, when the waters of the lake stretch away a sheet 
of blue, when the islands open their alluring vistas of 
winding channels through this world of brilliant color, the 
scene is one of unearthly beauty. It is little wonder the 
fame of Lake Atlin, its coloring, its reflections, has spread. 

The little town of Atlin lies on an open, level, grassy 
meadow, its streets, winding roads that lead out into the 
country and thickly bordered with wild flowers. A dainty 
wild flower said by some to be the wild flax powders the 
ground densely. Lovely bluebells droop their graceful 
heads, the buds being an exquisite pink, making a color 
combination that is ravishing. Wild roses, big, fragrant, 
flaunt their sweet pinkiness everywhere, deeper in color, 
larger and more fragrant, says Burbank, than any to be 
found elsewhere. Golden dandelions, purple-blue lupines 
add richness of color to the blossom beauty on all sides. 
On the outskirts of the town, great beds of hydro-mag- 



76 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

nesite three to ten feet thick spread over the ground, 
giving the effect of sheets of snow. It is used in the 
manufacture of steel and for fine clay for crucibles and 
is being shipped out for these purposes. 

A stroll through the Indian village is interesting, for 
though the Indian village of to-day is often a neat little 
town of frame houses and not at all the collection of tents 
and outdoor living one expects, it still has unique attrac- 
tion. Indian women are often to be seen curing moose 
and deer skins. Bright-eyed Indian children are playing 
about. The Indian dogs offer innumerable studies of 
canine life. And the old chiefs and young braves are seen 
at their usual task of doing little. The walk to the Indian 
village at Atlin can be continued through a young green 
wood of birch and willow to a pretty lakelet with a 
charming view of the surrounding mountains. At the 
opposite end of the town are some soda springs. Armed 
with lemon and sugar one can concoct here some good 
lemon soda water. The waters contain traces of potas- 
sium, soda, lime, magnesia and a large amount of carbonic 
acid. 

Among the things worth seeing in Atlin are the collec- 
tions of furs shown by some of the trappers. One gets to 
see the furs here just as they are brought in from the 
wild, and not only are the richness and beauty of the furs 
a delight to touch and sight but one gets quite an educa- 
tion in fur qualities. There are enormous bear skins to 
be seen, skins that make one realize the truth of the stories 
told of the size of Alaska's bears; skins of wolverines; of 
timber wolves; of foxes of all kinds; of marten, lynx, 
beaver, ermine; in fact, of every animal that haunts the 
Alaskan wild. They are all beautiful with the exquisite, 
soft colorings of the animal's environment — the black 
and white shadows of winter woods, the powdering of 



Beautiful Lake Atlin 77 

snow, the glow of warm sunlight — nature's tones in 
many moods caught and kept to protect the animal from 
watchful enemies. 

One of the delightful experiences of a stay at Atlin is 
a motor ride out to the mines. The principal output at 
present is gold, but silver, copper, and antimony have been 
found. The discovery of gold was made here in the rush 
of '98 by some of the miners on their way to the Klondike 
and quite a stampede took place to the creeks in this sec- 
tion, as many as forty thousand people having flocked in 
here and some $350,000 being taken out. In fact as has 
been said, the building of the White Pass and Yukon Rail- 
road was almost brought to a standstill by a large number 
of its workmen throwing down their tools and starting 
for the new discovery. An old prospector, now a resi- 
dent of Juneau, tells how he and his partners, who were 
among the first, if not the very first, to find gold here, 
were panning on one of the creeks, not having yet filed 
their claim as they wanted to be sure they had found pay- 
streak, when they saw a small boat on the shore of the 
lake. *' We're discovered," they shouted to each other, 
and leaving the two to look after the camp and the claim, 
the third " flew " as he expressed it, to the recording office 
to file. 

These exciting days, however, are gone by. The miners 
now go out to their claims in many cases by automobile. 
There are little towns along the way and much of the 
work is done by machinery, crude in some instances, but 
both time-saving and labor-saving. 

The road to the mines runs for a few hundred feet 
along the shore of the lake, and the sapphire waters and 
snowy mountains spread a vision of enchantment before 
the eye. Then it turns, and by scattered outlying houses 
of the village the car spins, the roadside a sheet of blue 



78 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

and pink and gold of wild blossoms and the green of 
grass. Soon it begins to climb through spruce and pine 
forests, the air spicy with their fragrance, the wayside 
still embroidered with the pink and blue and gold of the 
wild flowers. Backward over the hilltops, glorious views 
are caught of Atlin Lake and chain upon chain of snowy 
mountains, their sides and bases the ineffable tender blue 
of far distances. 

The deep, fragrant forest closes in again, granite walls 
begin to appear, and soon the road sweeps along the edge 
of a canyon where far below a mountain torrent foams 
over great rocks. Far ahead, glimpses of it can be caught 
winding through the pine woods before it leaps down 
between canyon walls. 

Soon the little town of Discovery is reached, a place of 
stores, log houses, a hotel or two, and the primitive cabin 
near which gold was first found on this stream. The ten- 
derfoot is apt to wonder why the name " Discovery " is 
so prevalent in mining districts, but the first find in a sec- 
tion is always called Discovery and the other claims lo- 
cated from it, as Number One above Discovery and Num- 
ber Two below Discovery, and so on. 

The stream broadens here and the road winds along 
above it and over a bridge and into a flat basin between 
two ranges of hills. Many mines are scattered through 
here which can be visited and the operations seen. A low 
tunnel in which is laid a narrow gauge track leads into 
the mine, a place extremely wet and muddy. In here the 
men shovel the pay dirt, a mixture of soft earth and cob- 
blestones large and small, into wooden boxes on low 
wheels, called by a stretch of the imagination, cars. These 
are drawn by means of a cable run by a water wheel out- 
side, over the little track out to the sluice boxes, where 
they are dumped, and a rushing stream brought in pipes 



Beautiful Lake Atlin 79 

washes away the gravel and stones and leaves the shining 
gold grains on the riffles to be taken out in the clean-up. 

It is hard, wet, muddy work, but there is always the 
pure, crisp, bracing air, the sweep of pine forests, the 
great uplifted range of snow peaks, the ever luring hope 
of an unexpected " find," and as one of the miners ex- 
pressed it, " Nobody to look down your shirt collar while 
you work." It is this outdoor life, the freedom, the ex- 
pectancy, that give this work its never-ending fascination 
to many. 

As one speeds along, many stakes of un worked claims 
can be seen, and abandoned windlasses, and other primi- 
tive methods of early days. In contrast to these oldtime 
hand methods when buckets of dirt were drawn up from 
below and washed out by hand is a big, flashing ditch and 
a dredge where endless buckets wound up by machinery 
bring the earth and it is washed out mechanically by the 
big dredge within. 

.Surprise Lake is soon reached, a pretty little body of 
water about sixteen miles long and a mile wide, dammed 
up to make it more useful to the miners down stream. 
Mountain peaks rise all about and little islands dot the 
waters. 

But by far the most glorious trip from Atlin is the one 
to Llewellyn Glacier. These trips are usually conducted 
by Mr. L. C. Read, who has a gas launch and a camp at 
the glacier for the accommodation of those going. Mr. 
Read is many things, among them a fine musician and an 
art photographer, but perhaps the greatest compliment 
one can pay him is to say he is a nature lover of the type 
of Muir and Burroughs. He is a New England man, well 
in his seventies, yet sturdy, hardy, and he knows almost 
every foot of the woods and waters of this region and 
loves It all, from the tiniest Alpine flower that grows at 



so Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

the foot of the glacier to the towering peaks that rise to 
the sky at its source. Not the least part of the pleasure of 
this trip is his company and the information he gives of 
the region, which with the stories he has to tell of bird 
and beast and native make the expedition an experience 
never to be forgotten. 

The launch speeds across the lake, the waters a jade 
green in one place, a sapphire blue in another, a deep 
purple in yet another stretch, the mountains mistily 
shrouded in tints of amethyst, their snow tops shining 
above. The colors at Atlin are seldom the same, and at 
times the waters have all the hues of tropical seas. 

As the farther shore is reached, the boat turns into a 
winding passage between Goat Island and the mainland, 
and the deep green of spruce and the brighter, more vivid 
green of birch and alder that blanket their sides comes 
into view. Islands dot the water and little points sweep 
picturesquely out, sometimes with an Indian camp with 
its red fire glow and straight, up-curling smoke to add to 
the primeval charm of the scene. A startled moose may 
crash away through the woods or a deer come daintily to 
the water's edge to drink. 

Gradually the mountains come closer and rise sheer in 
some places several thousand feet. In a shining, compact 
circle they seem to hem the way ahead, their wonderful 
reflections gleaming from the still waters at their base. 
Waterfalls leap down their sides, and if the way is 
blocked, in so lovely a spot one could well abide. 

But the channel turns, and past little wooded islands 
with wild flowers and grasses nodding from the shores 
the boat glides, out across a wide stretch of water, where 
ahead, behind and on all sides, mountains rise superbly, 
their shining peaks glowing faintly pink in the evening 
light, then into a narrow fiord it speeds, the water a won- 



Beautiful Lake Atlin 81 

derful jade green, the walls rising sheer and gray with 
silver streams flashing down their sides, and purple and 
gold flowers wherever a foothold can be found, on and 
on over this sheet of green water that shows not a ripple 
except those made by the boat, on through the stillness 
broken only by the murmur of the waterfalls, still on and 
on to the little curving beach at the end and the camp 
under the spruces. It is midnight, for the start was late, 
but the clear north light is shining and a thrush is singing 
in the woods. 

Many days could be spent here, for there are many 
trails that lure, but the chief trip is to the glacier. The 
boat takes one across a little arm of the fiord to a tiny 
beach, where a wee mother bird in wild alarm tries to 
persuade you to follow her even to her own destruction 
so that you touch not the tiny eggs in their nest on the 
sand. Into the spicy spruce woods you plunge by a nar- 
row trail that winds by tiny, trickling rivulets and over 
mossy logs and by small lakes with ever a wealth of wild 
flowers by its side — the bluest of blue forget-me-nots, 
purple-blue lupines, the lovely blue and pink bluebells, 
golden and white daisies, and other white and yellow and 
deep red and lavender blossoms innumerable, until you 
come to a break in the woods and ahead lies the great 
sheet of ice with magnificent snow peaks guarding it, and 
jagged peaks of bare rocks rising in it. Stretching in 
front of it is a plain of gray mud and sand and stones, 
through which a glacial stream rolls turbulently. In the 
warm sand, a porcupine is taking a sun bath, and another 
in the edge of the woods is climbing a tree, the yellowish 
brown and darker shadows of his coat scarcely distin- 
guishable from the light and shade on the trunk of the 
tree. 

Across the quivering mud, which may turn into a 



82 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

quicksand before you get back, through the sand and over 
the stones, which get more numerous the closer the gla- 
cier is approached, the route leads until at last you stand 
at the foot of the ice wall and hear the roar of the stream 
as it comes from great ice caves underneath, the cracking 
and breaking of ice, the rolling and rumbling of stones 
as tiny avalanches start far up the heights and come slid- 
ing down. 

The front is scanned for ways to climb and at last, on 
one side, by dint of scrambling, by clutching of snow and 
ice and rocks of the lateral moraine, progress is made, 
and the smoother, upper surface of the glacier is reached. 
It is a sight worth the climb. The sheet of ice sweeping 
upward to the far sky line sparkles as if strewn with 
millions upon millions of diamonds. Every point of ice 
and snow catches the light and flashes its message of bril- 
liant color to the cloudless blue sky above. Deep in 
crevasse and crevice, tiny streams gurgle, and in these 
depths shine the most exquisite of azure tones. Far up 
toward the head of the glacier, snow mountains lie se- 
rene and shining. Back over the basin of the bed moraine 
that has just been traversed, snow peaks lift themselves 
above the nearer mountains, which are clothed in green 
and cascaded with waterfalls. A great cornice of snow 
stretches from one peak to another, smooth, shining, 
making one long for wings to mount and walk on this 
edge of the world. Underneath could be seen with field 
glasses a great ice cave. 

But the gaze turns back to the glacier that here in soli- 
tude and majestic beauty is silently, slowly, surely, cre- 
ating worlds, making without turmoil or fret the conti- 
nents and valleys in which flowers will blossom, fruits 
grow and grains ripen centuries hence for the benefit of 
man. 



Beautiful Lake Atlin 83 

But however one would like to stay and study this epic 
of nature, the return must be made, and down its slippery 
slopes one cautiously picks his way till the rocks at the 
bottom are reached and the path taken back over the gray 
stones and gray sand and pasty gray mud. Stones of 
many odd shapes and sizes and colors can be found in 
this moraine, and in the mud and sand are seen the tracks 
of many wild animals. On this one trip the footprints of 
a grizzly bear, a wolf, a moose, the tracks of several wild 
goats, and those of other porcupines than those of the 
early morning were found. 

A second trip in this vicinity that yields a view unpar- 
alleled is to the top of Bold Bluff. This rises sheer at the 
head of the fiord and looks absolutely inaccessible. But 
the trail winds around it and is quite practicable even for 
the inexperienced climber. The top is much like that of 
Glacier Point in the Yosemite for one is straight above the 
fiord and the camp. But the view is far more wonderful. 
Ten great waterfalls were counted pouring down the sides 
of the opposite mountain which, roughly estimated, is 
two thousand feet high. The sweep of Llewellyn Gla- 
cier with its far snow mountains and its moraine and 
glacial river fills the view in another direction. Two 
beautiful shimmering mountain lakes nestling amid 
spruce-clad hills are seen on the third side while the fourth 
vista is filled with the green waters of the fiord and the 
lines of its sheer gray walls. It is a panorama of varied 
and unusual scenery such as it is doubtful if any other 
one point can give. 



CHAPTER VII 

on to dawson 
Losing a lake. Miles Canyon. White Horse Rapids and 

THEIR tragedies IN GOLD RUSH DAYS. WhITE HoRSE AND ITS 
BUSINESS OPENINGS. ThE UpPER YuKON AND ITS PICTURESQUE 

SCENERY. Five Finger and Rink Rapids. Fort Selkirk. 
The early history of the Yukon. The Pelly and Stewart 
Rivers and other important tributaries. 

At Carcross, where the train was left for the trip to 
AtHn, the journey is again resumed northward. The 
Watson River winds picturesquely along the route and 
Lewis Lake is soon reached, a lake, or the remains of one. 
which has rather a unique history. When the railroad 
was being constructed, it was found necessary to lower 
the level of the lake about fifteen feet. Man proposes but 
other forces dispose. The lake, when it once got started, 
was not to be stopped. The water cut its way through the 
soil till the banks were like a canyon, and the level was 
lowered seventy-five feet instead of the desired fifteen. 
The water rushed forth a veritable Johnstown flood. 
Fortunately, the country was not settled or great damage 
would have been done. 

Many other small lakes are passed and then the famous 
Miles Canyon, named for General Miles, is reached, the 
dread of early-day gold seekers. The canyon can be seen 
from the train. Deep and dark are the depths within the 
sheer walls and the current sweeps through with terri- 
fying force. About in the centre is a whirlpool, a basin 
nearly one hundred and fifty yards in diameter and with 

84 



On to Dawson 85 



steep, sloping walls where the crest of the waves must be 
ridden or the hapless voyager will go round and round. 
Beyond this the water plunges ahead with still greater 
swiftness and violence, for the fall in the lower part of 
the canyon is steeper than at the beginning. The canyon 
safely passed the danger is by no means over, for the 
White Horse Rapids loom ahead, and the seething froth 
and fury of this sheet of water make the stoutest hearts 
quail. At the lower end, the banks close in, making the 
channel narrow, and the waters swirl and leap with tre- 
mendous strength while hidden rocks add to the perils 
of navigation. 

The White Horse Rapids were named, it is said, for a 
Finn drowned here, whom the Indians called White Horse 
because of his flaxen hair and great strength. 

Many lives were lost in the early days in these two 
places. It is said that the gold seekers, eager as they 
were to reach the gold fields, would sit around at the 
head of the canyon getting their courage up, then take a 
few drinks and start. At one place in the rapids is a large 
rock over which the waters boil. It is said that at the 
sight of this those furiously chewing tobacco to keep up 
their nerve swallowed their nerve tonic at one gulp. 

Numerous stories are told of the experiences of these 
early days. Once a boat was seen whirling down appar- 
ently unoccupied, but while the watchers gazed, a man 
was seen to sit up and take a look. He had tied his boat 
as he thought securely and gone to sleep. But it had 
broken loose and started on its perilous voyage. When 
its owner saw where he was, he lay down in the bottom of 
the craft and gave himself up for lost. But the boat 
went through all right. Another voyager, who had 
worked day and night and saved every penny possible to 
get his outfit, was wrecked and lost all. Courageously 



86 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

he went back to the task of earning another stake. Again 
he set forth and met with the same mishap, managing to 
save his hfe but nothing else. Again he set himself to 
the task of earning and saving and the third time 
ventured the rapids that had robbed him without mercy. 
Again his boat and all his goods went beneath the waves. 
Finally he reached the bank, got a rude board, lettered it, 
" Hell can't be any worse than this. I'll take a chance," 
and committed suicide. 

Before the days of the gold seekers, it is said that 
scarcely a dozen men had passed through the canyon and 
rapids and lived to tell the tale. But nothing could stop 
this intrepid host. Into the yawning jaws of the canyon 
they sailed, rode the whirlpool, rushed through the lower 
end, swept out into the first swirl of the rapids, dashed 
on into their white, seething fury, and landed wet and 
breathless on the bank below, or gave their lives to the 
clutch of the chaotic waters. 

So many lives were lost that finally the Northwest 
Mounted Police, which did such admirable work all 
through these days, took the matter in hand, appointed 
pilots, permitted no boat to go through unless properly 
piloted, and forbade women passengers. 

Another measure of safety was taken by the building of 
a tramway around the rapids. It was a primitive affair, 
the rails being made of poles and the cars merely box 
trucks mounted on grooved wheels. The ties were at 
intervals of from three to ten feet as convenient, and the 
rails were spiked to them as inconsequentially. Occa- 
sionally on sharp curves, the outside rail was faced with 
iron plates. The cars were pulled by horses. The track 
wound through ravines, over gravel ridges, and here and 
there out to the banks of the rapids. Its path through the 
woods can still be seen as well as here and there some of 



On to Dawson 87 



the old rails. Primitive as it was, it saved many lives and 
outfits. 

To-day, however, the passengers in comfortable cars 
view the canyon from the train and take an automobile 
out to the rapids. The thrill of adventure remains only 
in story. 

White Horse is a pleasant little town backed with high 
bluffs and with the river in front. The streets are broad 
and clean. There are a number of good stores, several 
hotels and churches, and the barracks of the Northwest 
Mounted Police, neat buildings, many of them of log, set 
in a level, grassy space with flowers and paths bordered 
with whitewashed stones to lend a homelike air. 

The Royal Northwest Mounted Police, to give them 
their full title, is an association known the world over for 
the reign of law and order it establishes wherever it goes. 
In fact, so famous is it for bringing law breakers to jus- 
tice that they are careful to keep away from its realm. In 
the early days of the gold rush, it won wide renown for 
the way it handled the crowd that poured over the moun- 
tains into British Territory. Where, on the American 
side, all was confusion, the moment the boundary was 
crossed, all was system. In those days, and the practice 
is still adhered to, a register was kept of all persons start- 
ing for Dawson with a description of them and of their 
outfits and the name and address of the nearest relative. 
Copies were forwarded to Dawson. Upon the arrival of 
the newcomers at Dawson, they had to register, and those 
who did not register within a certain time were looked 
up. In Dawson during all its turmoil, there was little 
lawlessness in the way of theft and murder. In thirteen 
years there have been but twelve murders and every mur- 
derer was convicted and executed except one who died 
before the date set for his hanging. 



88 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Although one begins to feel that he is touching the 
edge of the Far North here at White Horse, for here the 
trip down that river of the North par excellence, the 
Yukon, begins, he is about in the same latitude as Petro- 
grad, which is not thought of as being out of civilization 
— geographically. 

Many mining interests centre around White Horse, for 
it is in a good mineral belt, but actual operations languish 
owing to the cost of getting in supplies. Mining experts 
have pronounced the copper belt here to be one of the 
largest mineral deposits on the American continent. 
Immediately to the west of the town is a copper belt 
fourteen miles long. Where work has been done, rich 
and large bodies of copper have been exposed. One work- 
ing shows a body of ore, thirty feet wide, five feet of 
which carry ten per cent copper while the balance shows 
four per cent together with good values of gold and silver. 
Another mine produced thirty thousand tons of six per 
cent ore in the first fifty feet. 

Silver has also been discovered, one prospect showing 
leads varying from one to seven feet, and carrying from 
fifty to three thousand ounces to the ton. These leads run 
for thousands of feet. 

Coal is another product of this district, and not far 
away is the water power of the White Horse Rapids 
which can be harnessed to help work all these deposits. 
With the development of the country and lowered cost of 
transportation this will, no doubt, one day be a great 
centre of mining, smelting and allied industries. 

It is doubtful if many can stand on the deck of one of 
the flat-bottomed, stern-wheeled boats that ply down the 
Yukon and not feel a thrill as it glides out of its dock at 
White Horse for the trip down this great river of the 
North. The experience is akin to that first slow quiver of 



On to Dawson 89 



the Atlantic liner that tells one he is actually off on that 
first momentous trip to Europe. The setting is vastly 
different, the boats are different, the passengers are dif- 
ferent ; but the two events are apt to stand out as two of 
the thrilling moments in one's life, for in each, one is 
sailing into such new, strange, but long anticipated worlds. 

The trip down the Yukon is unique in many ways. The 
wild, untamed beauty, the sense of plunging into the 
primeval, grips the imagination and the heart. One comes 
to feel a love for this great river and the vast stretches of 
wilderness that border it, a love that takes hold of one 
and never lets go its grasp. One may never return, but 
one never forgets that great, swiftly flowing stream and 
its wooded shores that stretch for thousands of miles with 
only a lonely log cabin here and there to break the soli- 
tude, or a little group of log houses clinging together in 
friendly fashion on the bank, tiny outposts of civilization 
on the edge of the wilderness. The vastness, the lone- 
liness, the silence take hold of one and weave a mantle of 
fascination that wraps one round about and sets him to 
dreaming. 

Then, too, the trip is unusually restful. The steamers 
are modern and thoroughly comfortable. An observation 
room forward with big, easy chairs enables one to view 
the scenery at ease and sheltered from wind and sun. The 
table is excellent. Indeed, it is a cause of comment that 
such variety of delicious food can be served so far from 
the base of supplies. Fresh fruits, salads and such deli- 
cacies are on the menu. The creature comforts thus pro- 
vided, one has nothing to do but to enjoy the strange 
scene that slips like a panorama before his eyes. 

The boats usually leave White Horse in the evening, 
but, as the hymn says, " There is no night there," so the 
hour of departure makes little difference in the enjoyment 



90 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

of the scene.. In Alaska in summer the clocks might as 
well take a vacation for one pays little attention to them. 
One can read as easily at midnight as at noon, and one 
seldom goes to bed until one or two o'clock. Yet there is 
little sense of fatigue or sleepiness, which perhaps proves 
that these things are, after all, only matters of habit. 

The boat slips from its dock almost without motion 
and without noise, the only sound indicative that the 
engines are at work being that same soft, gentle breath- 
ing that one heard on the steamers for Atlin. Forward 
into a broad, round basin the steamer glides and then 
turns and heads down the river on a pathway of gold into 
the setting sun. The " bone-yard " where unused and dis- 
abled boats are kept is passed. Among them is the first 
steamer on the Yukon and also a boat that came through 
Miles Canyon and the White Horse Rapids. Beyond this 
is an Indian reservation and its homes, and then nothing 
lies ahead but the sky glowing with purple and rose and 
gold and the water shimmering with the same lovely hues. 
High, cut banks hem the river in, a pale putty color in 
tone, and straight and sheer like palisades, their tops 
fringed with slender, spire-shaped spruce that is delicately 
reflected in the water, making a border of dark shadows 
and a trembling tracery of green for the rose and gold 
tints of the channel. These high, cut banks add a peculiar 
note to the scenery and play an important part in the 
unique charm of the Yukon. 

The channel is as varying as a coquette's moods. It 
broadens, it narrows, it turns sharply around high bluffs, 
it runs primly ahead as if it would never again turn from 
a straight and narrow way. The boat, too, seems to 
have peculiar and varying methods of travel. It seems 
to be swiftly drifting straight into the shore, but at the 
psychological moment it turns, and apparently as help- 



'^^ 



On to Dawson 91 



lessly drifts to the other bank. But there is a keen eye 
and a strong hand at the wheel, and the boat is being 
guided surely and safely though it seems to be zigzagging 
at will down the turbulent current. Piloting a Yukon boat 
is no easy task. In many places the channel is narrow 
and tortuous, and it changes constantly. Bars are formed, 
old channels filled, new channels made. One almost has 
to listen to the voice of the water as it ripples over bars 
and mud banks or glides silently through the deep places. 
But the captains on these boats are men who have sailed 
the Yukon many years, and they know its ways and 
speech, and the strange movements of the boat are but its 
response to their guiding hand. 

At times the high, cut banks disappear for a brief while 
and in their place are low, flat shores brightly green with 
grass and alders and willows, and glowing with fireweed 
and other wild flowers. Distant mountains appear, some 
with patches of snow. Flocks of wild duck spring up 
and hurry away on fluttering wings. The colors of sky 
and water deepen. One is not sailing on an ordinary 
stream, but over rose-tinted snow peaks, and green trees, 
and shimmering stretches of faint amethyst and deep 
blue and gold. 

Then the cut banks appear again with patches of vol- 
canic ash showing faintly white. The glowing colors 
fade and the world becomes a place of silver water and 
black shadows, and the boat sweeps out into Lake Le- 
barge, a great, placid sheet of water hemmed in with hills 
sweeping up at times into good sized mountains, then 
dropping to low, rounded summits giving a beautiful 
shore line. The lake was named for Michael Le Barge of 
Montreal, Canada, a member of the exploring party sent 
by the Western Union Telegraph Company to find a prac- 
ticable route for a telegraph line across Bering Strait and 



92 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

to the west of Europe. This party did not reach this sec- 
tion of the country as their work was at the mouth of the 
Yukon and on its lower reaches. But Le Barge heard of 
this lake and described it to others so glowingly that it 
was called Le Barge's Lake. 

From the lake the course lies through Thirtymile 
River, a narrow, tortuous channel, more dangerous, it was 
said, to the crafts of the gold seekers than either Miles 
Canyon or the White Horse Rapids. It is full of sunken 
rocks and reefs, gravel bars and upstanding rocks, and the 
current is swift. But the Yukon boats navigate it now 
with little trouble and then come broader and more peace- 
ful stretches as other streams pour in their waters. 

The first of these tributaries is the Teslin, Hootalinqua 
or Hootalinkwa, as it is variously named and spelled. 
This river drains Lake Teslin and in the days of the stam- 
peders was one of the routes to the Klondike being 
reached by way of the Stikine River at Wrangell. The 
name is an Indian name meaning " big fish," as these are 
found plentifully in its waters. 

Beyond the junction with the Teslin River, Cassiar Bar 
is passed, where may be said was practically the beginning 
of gold mining on the Yukon, for placer mining was done 
here in the '80's. Big Salmon, a cluster of log houses, is 
reached, the mail tossed ashore, and the latest news 
shouted. The dogs rush to the river bank at the sound of 
the steamer's whistle and watch anxiously to see if any- 
thing will be given them. 

The individual to most eagerly await the Yukon boat 
is by far the Yukon dog. At the sound of the whistle, 
he appears running at full speed. In fact, some run so 
furiously they are unable to check themselves on the 
edge of the bank and turn a somersault into the water. 
But it only lands them there ahead of the others, so they 



On to Dawson 93 



do not mind. Far down the bank into the water, and 
along the narrow strip of mud, they crowd, their faces a 
picture of eagerness and anxiety. Up and down the 
length of the boat they range, their eyes on its side, every 
glance full of heartrending expectancy. " Is it possible," 
they seem to say as the boat moves off and nothing has 
been tossed them, " that you are actually going without 
giving us anything?" The hardest-hearted cook is apt 
to relent and something is thrown from the galley win- 
dows. 

A landmark on this part of the river is Eagle Nest Rock, 
a great bare rock almost fifteen hundred feet high, where 
eagles nest. Cavities are seen in its side that look like 
entrances to mines. 

Another bluff that soon looms up is the Tantalus, so 
named by the early traders and miners because of the 
way it had of appearing and reappearing, by reason of the 
windings of the river, without apparently ever becoming 
any nearer. Coal was discovered near here and a coal 
mine opened and the name given to the mine. Several dis- 
coveries of coal have been made hereabouts, all showing 
prospects of large deposits. The first discoverer is said 
to have been George Carmack to whom is credited the 
discovery of gold on the Klondike. Large companies, 
however, have taken over the mining. The coal in this 
neighborhood is estimated to be enough to run every 
steamer, power plant and heating plant in Dawson for 
many years and could be delivered there for five dollars 
a ton. A plentiful supply of coal at low cost would mean 
much to the development of all this section, and if the 
mines are ever worked to their capacity will be a big 
factor in the development of the country. 

Every little while the high, cut banks reappear and one 
seems riding through continuous palisades that give a 



94 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

solemn, almost austere, grandeur to the scene. Some- 
times they slant upward with the smoothness and evenness 
of a railroad embankment, their top as level as if laid 
with shining steel. Again, when the face is steep and 
perpendicular, it will be broken with round, knoblike pro- 
jections clothed with grass. The river is continuously 
eating underneath these soft banks and earth and grass 
and vegetation fall in. It is this that constantly changes 
the channel of the river and fills it with drifting trees and 
with mud. In the spring, when the water is high and the 
current especially strong, it sweeps away the bank for 
miles, carrying log houses, even small settlements with it. 
All along the river can be seen these wrecked houses and 
little towns. And those that are left in the light of what 
has happened look perilously near the shore. 

The next point of interest is the Five Finger Rapids, 
and every one crowds forward to watch the passage 
through this narrow and famous channel. The walls of 
the river rise sheer and steep. A big rock in the middle 
disputes the way while islands ahead make the scene one 
of unusual beauty. The current is swift and the boat 
swings in, looking as if headed straight for the rock. 
But just as a crash seems inevitable, it turns, swings to 
the other side, and in a few seconds is out in the water 
beyond. In about twenty minutes Rink Rapids appear 
and the boat shoots over the foaming waters looking as 
if sliding down grade. The name Rink as applied to 
these second rapids always arouses curiosity and the boat 
officials when asked for an explanation say that the waters 
make a sound like the noise of a skating rink. But those 
who have delved into the early history of the river state 
that the name was given originally to the Five Finger 
Rapids in honor of Doctor Henry Rink, an authority on 
Greenland, any name connected with ice and snow evi- 



On to Dawson 95 



dently being thought appropriate for this section. Later 
when these rapids became generally known as the Five 
Finger, the name was moved down the river to the next 
stretch that needed christening. 

When the discovery of gold on the Klondike brought 
people by the thousands and steamers were put on the 
river to carry the crowds, the methods of coming up 
stream were sometimes unique. When the current is 
strong, it is no easy matter to get a steamer up over these 
rapids. At present, cables attached to the shore are used. 
But these were not then thought of or else time was too 
precious. One captain managed it by arranging with his 
pissengers that when he blew one whistle, they were all 
to run aft which would raise the bow sufficiently to get 
the boat up the rise of two feet of the rapids, that when 
he was half way over the stretch and blew two whistles 
they were all to run forward, which balanced the vessel 
like a seesaw and thus he got by. 

Beyond the Rink Rapids the scenery grows wilder, the 
cut banks rising sheer and steep, islands appearing, the 
river breaking into many channels, rugged mountains 
crowning the distance. The patches of volcanic ash ap- 
pear again, and it is said that sometimes the steamers 
stop and get their supply of scouring material for the 
silver. Alaska is extremely helpful. She provides boun- 
tifully for all needs whether it is gold to buy table service 
or material to clean it. 

Yukon Crossing, the next stopping place, shows the 
effect of the disastrous spring floods and the breaking up 
of the ice. An ice jam below the town raised the water 
twenty feet and swept away houses, drowned horses, and 
otherwise did much damage. 

The names of these settlements are often their most 
important characteristic. One will be looking for some 



96 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

semblance of a city, or, at least, a good-sized town. But 
all that appears is a handful of log cabins on the bank with 
grass and trees all about and no attempt at streets. They 
fit their setting however and are far more attractive than 
would be an attempt at a modern town. The boat runs up 
along the bank, a gang plank is thrown ashore, supplies 
and mail taken off, and the boat is away. 

Minto, some miles below Yukon Crossing, is a station 
on the winter trail between White Horse and Dawson, 
and has a big, log roadhouse and also a station of the 
Mounted Police. The winter stage road can be seen wind- 
ing over the hills. 

Below this the crater of an extinct volcano is seen and 
the banks show signs of volcanic rock. Then the waters 
of the Pelly River come in. Fort Selkirk appears, and the 
river without further questioning takes its name of the 
Yukon. 

This name is said to be a corruption of the Indian word, 
" Yukonna," which though generally translated " Big 
river " has a meaning greater than this in the Indian 
thought. It is as if they meant, The River, as if all other 
rivers sank into insignificance beside it. The name is 
one of those words whose fine flavor cannot be carried 
into another language. 

The Yukon here begins to get its first historic interest. 
Down the Pelly in 1842 came Robert Campbell, factor of 
the Hudson Bay Company. This company whose head- 
quarters were in Montreal had gradually pushed their 
trading posts farther and farther west into the wilderness, 
and Campbell, who had been exploring in the Mackenzie 
and Liard River regions with instructions to cross the 
divide in search of any river flowing to the westward, 
struck across country until he came upon a stream he 
named the Pelly, in honor of Sir H. Pelly, governor of 



On to Dawson 97 



the company, and he floated down this in a birch canoe to 
the Yukon. He did not know the river by this name but 
called it the Lewes, in honor of the chief factor of the 
Hudson Bay Company, a name still used by some for this 
part of the river. 

These various names given the upper stretches of the 
Yukon are puzzling to many travellers. At White Horse, 
the river is sometimes called the Fiftymile, below Lake 
Lebarge for a short stretch, the Thirtymile, thence to the 
junction with the Pelly, the Lewes. But gradually the 
name Yukon is superseding these, and without doubt in 
time will be applied to the whole course of the stream 
from White Horse down. 

None of these early explorers and traders on the upper 
Yukon knew it was the stream at whose mouth the Rus- 
sians had built Redoubt St. Michael, In those days it was 
believed that the Yukon emptied into the Arctic Ocean, 
the Colville River being thought to be the same stream. 

Campbell decided that the junction of the two streams 
was a good place for a trading post and as soon as he 
could get supplies from Montreal, which was no easy task 
since they must come overland through the wilderness, 
he established a fort. While waiting, he went on down 
the stream on an exploring trip to Fort Yukon, a post of 
the Hudson Bay Company farther down. 

But the post Campbell established was not left undis- 
turbed. The Chilkat Indians of the coast, who found 
their trade dropping off with the Indians of the interior, 
the Stick Indians as they were called because they came 
from a region of sticks as compared with the big timber 
of the Chilkat country, decided to investigate. They dis- 
covered the fort, soon learned the reason why they were 
getting no more furs, and fell upon the place and de- 
stroyed it. Campbell escaped, made himself a raft of 



98 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

driftwood bound together with withes cut with his jack- 
knife and floated down the Yukon until he met a party of 
his own traders. He secured suppHes from them and set 
out across the wilderness for the East, being anxious to 
get permission to rebuild the fort. But though he finally- 
carried his request to London, his wish was not granted 
and Fort Selkirk or what remained of it was abandoned. 
This remarkable journey from Fort Selkirk to London, 
a distance of ninety-seven hundred miles, more than three 
thousand of which he travelled on snowshoes in the dead 
of winter through practically an uninhabited wilderness, 
shows the mettle of the man, and is but one of many 
similar records of which this North country abounds. 

Near the site of this old fort, the present settlement of 
Fort Selkirk is located, Arthur Harper, a trader whose 
name is associated with activities along the Yukon in the 
gold mining days, having established a post here when 
miners began to come into this section. It is the most 
pretentious settlement on the river since White Horse. 
Quite a number of houses are scattered along the bank and 
there is a school house and a general store. Indians stand 
in groups impassively watching the boat, one young girl 
making one think of a shy, wild bird, so sweet is she in 
her modest grace and charm. 

A miner left the steamer here with his outfit for a 
three hundred mile trip up the Felly in a poling boat. 
Much of the pleasure of a trip on the Yukon is the meet- 
ing with these hardy pioneers and hearing their expe- 
riences. To see them trudge hopefully away with their 
pack on their back, or start in some little boat for a trip 
up some lonely river is to get a glimpse of a kind of life in 
striking contrast to that of the steamer. 

The Felly down which Campbell came and up which 
this miner went is a beautiful river meandering in grace- 



On to Dawson 99 



ful curves through a broad valley. It has many long, 
smooth, hard gravel bars, and high banks carved into 
turrets and pillars and other graceful forms. Here and 
there it plunges through canyons and always in the back- 
ground are the towering mountains. In the valley of this 
river now are farms : one of a hundred acres supplies 
oats and native hay to the roadhouses and miners. The 
Macmillan River, a tributary of the Pelly, flows through 
a great mountain sheep country and is a region sought by 
hunters of this game. 

A landmark of the Yukon just beyond Fort Selkirk is 
Victoria Rock, an interesting study in mountain model- 
ling, for nature has sculptured here an excellent profile of 
a charming old lady. 

At the mouth of the Pelly begin what are sometimes 
called the Upper Ramparts of the Yukon, a great, ram- 
part-like wall that forms the bank of the river for about 
ten miles. Its level top and straight sheer drop are im- 
pressive and give a bit of unique river scenery probably 
not equalled elsewhere in the world. 

The next two streams of importance to join the Yukon 
are the White River and the Stewart River. The White 
River was so named by Campbell because of its color. 
There are immense deposits of volcanic ash along it, and 
this pulverized pumice stone in rainy weather is washed 
into the stream. Its waters are also glacial and this 
double burden poured into the Yukon beclouds its hitherto 
sparkling waters. 

The Stewart is one of the principal tributaries of the 
Yukon and has played quite an important part in open- 
ing up this region. It is said that every bar of the Stewart 
River has money in it, and had the Klondike discovery 
never been made, the Stewart would no doubt have 
brought many miners to this section. It was discovered 



100 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

in 1849 and named for one of Campbell's clerks at Fort 
Selkirk. About two hundred miles above its mouth are 
Fraser Falls where the river flows through a gorge with 
falls and rapids, making a pretty bit of scenery, and offer- 
ing to the speculative eye the possibility of generating 
horse-power to run dredges on the river. In the Stewart 
River section are several farms with comfortable build- 
ings, herds of cattle and fields of hay. 

The discovery of gold on the Stewart brought trading 
posts and one was established here by Harper who 
founded the one on the site of Fort Selkirk, and his part- 
ners, McQuesten and Mayo. 

The names of this trio are almost synonymous with 
the early development of all this region. In fact, Mc- 
Questen has been called the Father of the Yukon. They 
came into the country by way of the Mackenzie and the 
Porcupine, arriving at Fort Yukon in 1873. In 1874. 
McQuesten established a trading post at Fort Reliance, 
six miles below the present site of Dawson, and the point 
from which distances were reckoned which gave such 
names as Fortymile, Sixtymile to mining camps. As gold 
was discovered at various places, these men quickly fol- 
lowed with their posts and Circle City. Ogilvie and many 
other settlements were started. 

As the settlements as they are passed recall the stories 
and struggles of these early days, the journey grows more 
interesting. The river is ever beautiful. Now wide, now 
narrow, it sweeps on, sometimes with many channels, 
sometimes with just one between high bluffs, until at last 
a high mountain looms on the left, an island in the middle 
of the stream, two domes on the right, one with a great 
scar like a cave high on its side, and Dawson appears. 



CHAPTER VIII 



THE DAWSON OF TO-DAY 



A TOWN OF FRIENDLINESS AND CHARM. ThE SEAT OF THE PRO- 
VINCIAL Government. Robert Service's cabin. Farming 
AT Dawson. Social life. Indoor and outdoor sports. 
Modern methods of gold mining. 

The Dawson of to-day is a pleasant town of neat 
homes, thrifty gardens, and many flowers, both indoors 
and out. On the front street, one walks along the river 
bank which makes the stream seem much nearer and 
friendlier than when it is shut off by huge factories and 
railroad tracks. At the rear of the town, the houses 
climb up the green slopes of Sunset Dome, the homes 
looking very pretty as they nestle in the green of the 
hillside. This friendly contact with both mountain and 
river may be the cause of the town's peculiar charm, for 
it has a charm felt at once. Across the river, another 
great, green dome looms, and up and down the stream 
hills and mountains are seen. But though thus encircled, 
there is a sense of openness and spaciousness that is a de- 
light, perhaps because the streets are wide and every- 
where are caught visions of mountains and wood and 
stream. 

There is also a friendly air in the life of the town. 
Signs read, " Jimmy's Place," " Sam's Store," and you 
feel that if you go in, Jimmy and Sam will wait upon you 
with a cheery kindliness that will make purchasing quite 
a different experience from what it is elsewhere. 

101 



102 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

The city is modern in every respect and has electric 
Hghts, telephones, many hotels, a good school, a library, 
and several churches. The school, it may be said to 
Dawson's credit, was erected in 1901, but three years 
after the rush. It is a large building with facilities for 
the teaching of all grades up to honor matriculation into 
Toronto University. That such a matter was so well 
attended to in the mad excitement of those days speaks 
well for the temperament of Dawson. 

The most pretentious buildings of the town are the 
Commissioner's residence, the Administration Building, 
the post office and subsidiary buildings connected with 
official work, for Dawson is the seat of all the machinery 
of the provincial government. Some of the buildings 
are attractive frame structures several stories in height, 
surrounded by well-kept lawns, flower beds, and neat 
fences. The Administration Building can accommodate 
eighty officials. The Commissioner's or Governor's resi- 
dence is impressive in appearance and handsomely fur- 
nished. Near by is a park where baseball, tennis, and 
other games are enjoyed. This little centre of a larger 
life gives quite an urban air to the town and makes it far 
more impressive than is the usual place of small houses 
and log cabins. 

On one of the outlying thoroughfares which some of 
the residents of Dawson are endeavoring to have named 
Service Street, is Robert Service's cabin. It sets back in 
a grass-grown yard with wild roses and bluebells min- 
gling with the high grass, and with a fence made of small 
saplings enclosing the premises. The Union Jack flies at 
the peak of the porch roof and moose antlers lift their 
graceful lines against the sky. 

The cabin is rustic throughout. The porch steps are 
logs, the railings are of slender poles, and a big porch 



The Dawson of To-day 103 

chair is made of similar poles and saplings. There is one 
room with a little kitchen back. The cabin is situated on 
the slope of Dawson Dome and has a fine view down over 
the town, out across the river to the big mountain on the 
other side, and up and down the stream to the farther 
mountains that block the view. 

Some children playing in the street when asked once by 
a curious visitor what the occupant did responded ear- 
nestly, " He don't do nothing. He just sits on the porch 
and then goes in and writes." 

The world, however, is not likely to agree with them. 
His poems are popular with lovers of outdoors, those 
favored with the wanderlust, and with all who appreciate 
the spirit of the pioneer. His poems have a big sale 
throughout Canada and the Northwest, and copies of his 
works at public libraries are always " out." 

Mr. Service was born in England but raised and edu- 
cated in Scotland, taking some studies at the Glasgow 
University. When twenty years of age he came to Can- 
ada and thence onward to the Pacific slope. While in 
the Yukon he held a position for some time as a clerk in a 
bank. Those who know him speak of him as exceedingly 
quiet and reserved, as one who enjoys listening to the 
stories which often he later embodied in his poems, but as 
not entering actively or intimately into the life about him. 

The Dawson people are flower lovers. Indoors and 
out blossoms riot. Window boxes and hanging baskets 
are everywhere. The streets, too, are well bordered with 
wild flowers — bluebells, fireweed, wild mustard, wild 
roses, and other blossoms — giving the town a gay, bright 
air. Almost every home has its garden, and several hot- 
houses supply hotels and restaurants with tomatoes, let- 
tuce, radishes, onions, and such delicacies. One hothouse 
had at one time fifty tomato plants loaded with the lus- 



104 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

cious red globes and cucumber vines on poles under the 
glass equally well freighted. 

Lettuce, radishes, onions, and such small stuff are 
started in the greenhouses in February and by March the 
products are on the market; so that the people of Dawson 
have these delicacies almost as early as those in the States 
served from the South. Celery, tomatoes, peppers, egg- 
plant, cucumbers, and the like, are started in March and 
transplanted to open ground later, in May if the weather 
is suitable ; so that this supposedly Arctic region is not so 
far behind what are considered more favorable sections. 

Back in the hills are many farms. On one of one hun- 
dred and sixty acres are raised hay and vegetables, and 
the owner has a good herd of stock. Oats are ripened 
and threshed about Dawson, and large quantities of wild 
hay are cut. Oats that cut fifty bushels to the acre have 
been harvested, and potatoes dug that produced two hun- 
dred to three hundred bushels to the acre. 

It was one of the stampeders in the rush of '98 who 
first started to raise vegetables in this section, and his 
efforts met with the ridicule initial efforts in a new line 
are so apt to do. He was laughed at for thinking he could 
raise anything in this latitude and in ground which only 
a foot or so beneath the surface was frozen. To the sur- 
prise, however, of those who laughed, the man succeeded. 
The seeds produced fine vegetables for which he got a 
fabulous price from the eager-for-green-things Klon- 
dikers. The next year he planted a larger garden on an 
island near the mouth of the Klondike River and here his 
vegetables matured much more rapidly than before. He 
sold his crops faster than he could gather them, and got 
such remarkable prices as six dollars a dozen for stalks 
of celery, thirty-five to fifty cents a pound for turnips, car- 
rots, beets, cabbages and such products. A man who has 



The Dawson of To-day 105 

a hothouse in Dawson to-day said regretfully that if he 
had only started to raise vegetables when he first came in- 
stead of hunting gold, he would now be wealthy. 

The success of this pioneer gardener started others, and 
the industry rapidly spread. Each year it has increased, 
until to-day about two hundred acres of land are under 
cultivation in and around Dawson, and the crops produced 
compare favorably with those outside. 

Life in Dawson has many pleasant social features. The 
winter, the time when many think that the people sit in 
semi-darkness hugging red-hot stoves, is the gayest sea- 
son. There are many fraternal and beneficial societies 
in Dawson, including the Masons, Yukon Pioneers, Odd 
Fellows, Eagles, Moose and Arctic Brotherhood, and they 
give delightful dances. Concerts by local talent of no 
mean order are also given. 

Sleighing, toboganning, and snow-shoeing are among 
the outdoor sports. The chief social amusements, how- 
ever centre around Dawson's Amateur Athletic Associa- 
tion's skating rink, which provides exhilarating sport for 
hundreds nightly throughout the winter. The Curling 
Club's rink is in the same building, the membership being 
one of the largest in the world. 

The club building is a mammoth affair costing $42,000 
and is virtually a part of the municipality, and as notable 
a branch of the Yukon public affairs as the capitol build- 
ing or any part of the government. It numbers among its 
supporters and adherents almost every man, woman, and 
child in the town and many who live out on the creeks. 
The building covers an area one hundred by two hundred 
feet and the front part is two stories high. It is lighted 
by electricity and many of the rooms are steam heated. 
In addition to the fine sheets of curling ice and the skat- 
ing rink, there are handball courts, a fine gymnasium. 



106 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

shower baths, a reading room, a bilHard room, and a 
large reception hall. In the summer, the skating rink 
space is transformed into a natatorium with a tank eighty- 
feet long and thirty-five feet wide and with an average 
depth of seven feet. 

During the summer, outdoor sports come to the fore. 
Baseball is popular, and the games are played in Minto 
Park, which was built at a cost of $12,000. The games 
are often played at midnight. Indeed the midnight games 
are rather a feature of Alaskan life. International games 
are played here and the Dawson team often journeys to 
other Alaskan cities, one year sending its team to Fair- 
banks, seven hundred miles away, to compete for the In- 
ternational Championship North of Fifty-three. 

Football is played nearly as much as baseball. The 
Indians have a good team and some spirited games are 
pulled off. The natives play better with a buckskin ball 
filled with caribou hair than with the regulation ball. The 
matches played with the Indians and their ball are fast 
and furious, for the reason that this ball cannot be sent 
any great distance with a kick or punch, and the players 
are consequently concentrated about the ball most of the 
time. Moccasins instead of shoes are worn, a handicap 
for the Canadian players, as this footwear hurts their 
toes, all features, however, which add to the enjoyment of 
the game by the spectators. 

Any one who has seen the Indian team from Carlisle 
in the States play knows that the Indians put up a good 
football game. 

Dawson has many interesting trips for the sightseer. 
A climb up the dome back of the town is one of the 
favorites. The huge scar on this hillside that looks like 
the mouth of a crater is seen long before Dawson is 
reached. It was caused by a great earth slide which it is 



The Dawson of To-day 107 

said buried an entire village of Indians. Its resemblance 
to a dressed moosehide gave the mountain in the early 
days the name of Moosehide or Mooseskin. But to-day 
it is generally called Sunset Dome or Midnight Dome be- 
cause of the pilgrimages made to its summit by midnight 
" sunners." 

The trail winds by fairly easy zigzags up through pop- 
lar and spruce and wild flowers innumerable till the bare 
top is reached about twenty-nine hundred feet above the 
sea level. A wonderful view is the reward. The river 
winds away through the hills, a quiet river that knew little 
but the canoe of the Indian and trader, the flash of the 
wild bird's wing, and the leap of the salmon, until the 
stream of gold that poured from the hills brought the 
world to its bosom. The eye follows this gold stream, the 
Klondike, back into the hills, among which lie the famous 
creeks whose sands were gold, and then on to the great 
sweep of snow peaks that bound the horizon on the east- 
ern edge, the far northerly outposts of the Rocky Moun- 
tains. 

Another pretty trail leads to Moosehide, an Indian 
settlement about three miles down the river. 

A trip none should miss is a visit to the creeks which 
yielded the treasures of gold that astounded the world. 
This can be taken by motor, or by walking if only the 
nearer ones are visited and one does not mind a walk of 
eight or ten miles. 

The car spins out over a good road along the Klondike 
River, a mountain wall on one side, the stream on the 
other. The river is filled with great heaps of tailings from 
the dredges that are slowly eating their way up its bed, 
devouring the gold, leaving the stones and refuse behind. 
The river at times is almost blocked and has difficulty in 
making a channel. In some places earth has been filled in 



108 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

between the piles of stones, and little gardens have been 
planted here. In the early days, up this stream an almost 
endless stream of prospectors mushed, carrying their 
packs on their backs. 

Across Ogilvie Bridge, named for William Ogilvie, 
Commissioner of the Yukon in the days of the gold rush, 
the road runs past a large field filled with growing pota- 
toes but only waiting for the dredge to come and extract 
its gold, past the buildings of one of the big gold mining 
companies, and then turns up the famous Bonanza Creek. 
Once this was a clear, dashing mountain stream between 
enclosing green hills. To-day it is a scene of desolation, a 
broad flat basin with water trickling here and there and 
with the hills being washed down by powerful hydraulic 
streams that sweep away great rocks and boulders and 
gravel beds as if they were the sands of the sea. The road 
that once ran alongside the creek bed is now built high 
above it on tailings and climbs up the mountain side at 
a good grade, the scene growing more and more desolate. 
Great black nozzles spout streams that tear down the 
hills and wear deep gulches in the rock where sluice boxes 
are placed. These gullies are sometimes scarcely half a 
yard wide but thirty and more feet deep and are every- 
where. Here and there are great pieces of what look like 
rock standing out in lonely isolation, but in reality they 
are pieces of ice slowly being disintegrated by the sun. 
Mountain sides that look like perpendicular walls of white 
sand are being rapidly washed away by the volume of 
water dashed against them. Heaps of tailings, running 
streams of sand, mud, water, deep gullies are everywhere. 
It is a scene of inextricable confusion and awe-inspiring 
desolation. Rainbows dance in the water, for nature 
never forgets to be beautiful, but the green beauty of the 
hills is gone. Here and there the cabin of an old timer, 



The Dawson of To-day 109 

the roof fallen in, moss growing over it, speaks of other 
days and other ways. 

The ditch that brings the water for all this work is a 
wonderful piece of construction. It starts some seventy 
miles back in the hills, crosses precipitous mountain tops, 
frozen morasses, deep ravines, wide valleys, rugged moun- 
tain chains, and finally delivers its burden by an inverted 
siphon over the Klondike River to the mining camps. 

In the dijfficulties overcome and the daring novelty of 
its conception, the enterprise is looked upon as akin to 
the building of the Panama Canal, except that in some 
ways greater obstacles confronted the workers here. Sup- 
plies had to be brought almost two thousand miles from 
civilization and much farther than this from factories. 
Men and machinery had to be assembled far in the in- 
terior of a country which, until within a few years, had 
been thought to be inaccessible. An army of men had to 
be cared for and fed over a trackless area far from even 
the helpful Yukon. New methods of road building and 
other constructive work had to be devised for the mo- 
rasses and other peculiarities of land which the ditch 
traverses. For instance, in one place it ran through a 
glacier, layers of ice being uncovered the moment the 
upper muck was removed. Cribbing was resorted to, the 
sides being lined with moss and dirt, thus taking a lesson 
from the country itself, where pure ice is found many 
thousands of years old unthawed in the hottest summer 
weather because it is protected by the natural growth of 
moss with decayed vegetation and sand filled in between 
the interstices. 

The ditch is made up of nineteen and a half miles of 
flume, twelve and a half miles of steel and stave pipe, and 
thirty-eight miles of ditch varying every few miles in 
methods of construction, in dimension, in grade, in the 



110 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

nature of the ground traversed. The Klondike River is 
crossed by a line of steel pipes over a steel bridge built on 
concrete piers. Ten million feet of lumber were used for 
the flumes necessary to carry the water of the ditch over 
ravines and such places. 

At the head of a jagged mountain range above timber 
line is a modern electrical power plant sending its cur- 
rents along heavy copper wires to the distant valleys of 
the Klondike to turn the wheels, pump the water, elevate 
the gravels, wash the black sand, drive the dredges, and 
light the works at night. Here in these creek valleys 
where all this work is being done are many inventions for 
mining devised to meet conditions in the North. One of 
these is the electric elevator, or the electric dredgeless 
dredge, as it has been called. This elevator cleans out the 
last vestige of gold from the creeks before the hills are 
washed down on them. It works on the principle of a 
dredge but without the pond, this being replaced by a 
sumphole into which the surrounding gravels are hydrau- 
licked. From the top of the steel tower carrying the 
string of buckets runs a line of sluice boxes into which 
everything from the sumphole is elevated or pumped. 
By this method large areas of bedrock are finally exposed 
and drained. Then men get to work with shovels and 
picks and scrapers and the bedrock is cleaned of every 
particle of gold. Each bucket holds three cubic feet of 
gravel and there are seventy-six of these buckets in a 
string. Twenty-four buckets are dumped every minute. 

The ditch is a great feat of construction within the 
shadow of the Arctic Circle of which Dawson may well 
be proud. 

Such are Dawson and its mines to-day. The Dawson 
and its mines of yesterday are a different story. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE DAWSON OF YESTERDAY 

Origin of name Klondike. The two claimants for the honor 
OF discovering Klondike gold. The early argonauts. 
The city in gold rush days. Its tragedies and comedies. 
The first Christmas. The hardships of mining. 

Before the discovery of gold on the Klondike roused a 
part of the world to semi-madness, the little, flat stretch 
of land between Sunset Dome and the river was covered 
with scrub timber and wild grasses, and fringed with 
alders and willows along the bank of the stream. Its 
likeness can be seen to-day in thousands of little, meadow- 
like expanses along the Yukon, perhaps in time to be the 
scene of just such frenzied crowds as was Dawson, for 
no one can venture to prophesy the surprises Alaska has 
for the world. Across the Klondike River, which flows 
into the Yukon here, was another little flat lying under the 
shadow of a big, rocky cliff. Here were a small Indian 
settlement, a few cabins of white men, and the ever pres- 
ent saloon. 

The Klondike River was a famous salmon run and the 
Indians living at its mouth drove stakes in the water here 
to compel the fish to enter traps set for them. These 
stakes had to be hammered into the gravel of the river 
bed and the Indians called the stream Trondig, or Ham- 
mer-water, Tron meaning hammer, and tiuck or diuck, 
pronounced tig or dig, meaning water. McOuesten and 
Harper, the traders who had established a post at Fort 

111 



112 Alaska, Our Beautiful Nortliland 

Reliance about six miles down the river, used this name 
in speaking of the place and it gradually became cor- 
rupted to Klondike which eventually came to stand for 
the whole district. 

Down the Yukon at Fortymile, up the near-by Stew- 
art River, and on various creeks and bars, a few miners 
were working. They had been drifting into this section 
since the early '80's and by 1896 several hundred were 
scattered throughout the district, making all the way from 
a few dollars up to a hundred and more a day. 

Near these mining settlements, the traders, Harper, 
McQuesten and Mayo, had, as has been said, established 
posts; one at Fortymile, another at Ogilvie opposite the 
mouth of Sixtymile Creek, another at Fort Reliance near 
the present site of Dawson, one at the mouth of the Stew- 
art River, one on the site of old Fort Selkirk. In fact, 
wherever the news of a gold discovery brought miners, 
one or the other of these traders followed. Thus half a 
dozen or so of these log trading posts were located along 
the river, and they became the central points for news of 
gold strikes. 

As far back as 1859, one of the Hudson Bay clerks had 
written home from the post on the Yukon River where he 
was working, " There is a small river not far from here 
where gold has been seen so plentifully that it could be 
gathered with a spoon. I have often wished to go but 
could never find the time. If I could only get time to 
make an expedition up the Yukon, I expect I could find 
it in abundance." 

The miners, however, let nothing interfere with their 
search for gold. Up and down the river, back on the 
creeks that emptied into it, and across the mountains that 
hemmed these streams in, they went with pick and shovel, 
eyes alert for the shining metal. 



The Dawson of Yesterday 113 

The finds were comparatively small and news of them 
trickled slowly to the outside. But, nevertheless, a thin 
stream of prospectors kept coming. Among these was 
Robert Henderson of Nova Scotia, who arrived in 1894 
with a small party of miners and began prospecting on 
the upper Yukon and the Pelly. Continuing down the 
river, the party stopped at Fort Reliance, and here Hen- 
derson was told of gold on the Indian River, a stream 
across a low divide from the Klondike. 

It was comparatively virgin ground, for the news cir- 
culated at these posts was often the merest conjecture, 
no one perhaps having found gold in the district under 
discussion but simply believed it to be there because of the 
formation. 

However, what Henderson heard was sufficient to make 
him desire to prospect the territory and he spent the win- 
ter and the following year working various small claims 
in this section and panning out some six hundred dollars' 
worth of gold. Eventually in this work he crossed the 
divide to a stream he called Gold Bottom and which he 
believed flowed into the Klondike River. On the way 
back to his claim from Ogilvie whither he had gone for 
supplies, he decided to ascend the Klondike River. 

At the mouth of the stream he met George Carmack 
and two Indian companions, Skookum, or Strong, Jim 
and Tagish Charlie. Henderson told Carmack of Gold 
Bottom and invited him to come and stake. Carmack 
said he would and that he would bring his two Indian 
friends. To this Henderson objected, as he did not wish 
the stream to be staked by Indians, and there was some 
little dispute about the matter. But finally they parted on 
apparently good terms. 

For some little while Carmack did not go, but finally 
he and the Indians decided to accept the invitation, and 



they started going by way of the now famous Bonanza 
Creek and across the divide to where Henderson was 
working. Some say that on the way Carmack found 
some gold on Bonanza Creek. Others claim he did not 
discover it until on the way back. But if he did find it he 
said nothing to Henderson about it. Carmack and his 
friends seemed to think little of the ground Henderson 
was working and soon left, returning by the way they had 
come. 

When again on the Bonanza, Carmack shot a 
moose and took a piece of it to the stream to wash. While 
doing this he saw gold in the water, and getting a pan 
quickly washed out a greater quantity of nuggets than he 
had ever seen in a single pan. He staked a claim and the 
Indians with him also staked. The news of course was 
soon known and miners flocked in from all near-by camps. 
Henderson, across the divide at Gold Bottom, knew noth- 
ing of it till the creek bed was all taken. So, though it 
was found because of his invitation to Carmack, Hender- 
son received no benefit from it. He is, however, by some 
looked upon as the original discoverer of the Klondike, 
because he was the first to do any continued mining in this 
region and by reason of his work Carmack and the thou- 
sands of others followed. No doubt, though, he would 
prefer, like some of Omar's followers, " To take the cash 
and let the credit go." 

The effect of the news upon the world is historic. 

The farthermost parts of the earth contributed its 
quota of men — and women. From Sidney and Mel- 
bourne, Australia; from Hong Kong and other parts of 
Asia: from Cape Town, Africa; from London and Paris 
and Petrograd; from cities and villages and farms of our 
own country they poured. Many a dignified, white- 
haired official of some big, metropolitan company will 



The Dawson of Yesterday 115 

tell to-day with a flash of his eyes that shows a relish for 
the adventures of those days still lurks under his suave 
exterior, of his amateur boat building, of his eager, hope- 
ful search, possibly of his failure to find what he was 
seeking. But there is little regret for the quest. The zest 
of the seeking, after all these years, leaves a flavor that is 
still good. 

Various were the routes by which these modern argo- 
nauts sought this Eldorado — by the Stikine River and 
Lake Teslin, by the Chilkoot or White Pass, by St. Mi- 
chael and up the Yukon, some even across the interior 
from Valdez or Cordova, little knowing the vast region 
and the tremendous mountain ranges that blocked their 
way. Almost as difficult was the route taken by some via 
the Mackenzie River and the great Arctic plain. One man 
who came in this way said his party were more than a 
year getting in. His face was grave and his eyes re- 
flective as he said it, as if he were seeing again that year 
of hardship, sheer endurance and grim perseverance that 
brought them through. Nearly all, however, foregath- 
ered at Seattle for the first part of the journey by boat. 

Seattle was not ready for such an influx. Boats for 
such numbers were few. But the stampeders would not 
wait, and so they put forth in all sorts of craft loaded to 
the water line. Boats that had accommodations for 
twenty carried three hundred. Meals on some were 
served in wash tubs, each man taking a plate, dipping out 
what he wanted, and sitting where he could. On others, 
the serving of meals went on all day, so few could be 
served at a time owing to the cramped quarters. In such 
state they sailed through the beautiful Inside Passage or 
took the outside route to St. Michael. There are insuffi- 
cient buoys and lighthouses to-day, and in those times 
there were still fewer. Often the only way to discover 



116 Alaska, Onr Beautiful Northland 

the proximity of dangerous shores in a fog or at night 
was to blow the whistle and listen for the echo. So that 
added to the discomfort of the trip was the constant 
danger of shipwreck. 

The majority landed at Dyea and Skagway and rushed 
for the interior over the Chilkoot and White Pass trails. 
At first there were no wharves, for like Dawson these 
places sprang into being with the coming of the stam- 
peders. Goods and passengers were loaded on scows and 
lightered ashore, often to be stranded on the mud flats if 
the tide was low or swamped if it was coming in. Horses 
were put overboard and compelled to swim. It was a 
scene day and night of commotion and confusion. 

Dyea, and, later, Skagway, were filled with a motley, 
enthusiastic, excited crowd of between thirty and forty 
thousand people. Supplies of all kinds were piled on the 
beach, on open ground, in tents, in such structures as the 
town had. Horses, mules, dogs abounded. Criminals 
of all kinds flourished. Gambling dens and dance halls 
were on all sides. Men with plenty of money one day 
would be penniless the next. But every one was so eager 
to get on that no attention was paid to the tales of dis- 
tress told. Cries for help, shouts of murder, the crack of 
firearms, the rasping voice of music hall singers, floated on 
the air day and night. " Fights were so common," said 
one man telling of these days, " that a fellow wouldn't 
get up even if the bullets came into his cabin or tent." 

Singly or in parties, prospectors almost hourly set off 
for the interior. Over Chilkoot Pass they wound, an un- 
ending line of men and women, so close together that if 
one dropped out from exhaustion, or to fix his pack, the 
gap closed up and it was difficult to get in again. Each 
staggered along under as much as he could carry, the 
packs weighing from fifty to one hundred and fifty 



The Dawson of Yesterday 117 

pounds. One man, a big, hearty Scandinavian, who came 
in over the Stikine trail, pulled four hundred pounds on 
a sled for months. 

A similar horde toiled up the White Pass over boulders 
and trees, along the rushing river, often finding it difficult 
to secure a foothold. 

This tide of humanity never ceased summer or winter. 
With blizzards filling the air with blinding snow, and al- 
most smothering man and beast, with the wind tearing 
through the passes with a strength almost impossible to 
withstand, so that the mushers had to walk in crouching 
positions and often seek the shelter of trees till the worst 
fierceness of the blast had passed, with avalanches bury- 
ing men and women and supplies, they toiled on. 

Supplies were cached along the trail. Sometimes a 
little foundation was made of pine or spruce boughs, the 
goods laid on this and covered with a tarpaulin bearing 
the owner's name. But usually they were just piled on 
the ground or snow and covered. As much as could be 
carried would be taken five or six miles ahead and cached 
and then the return trip made for more. As many as ten 
or a dozen trips were often necessary before a man could 
get all his supplies moved forward, which practically 
meant that the pass was climbed that many times. Those 
who had horses, dogs, or even goats packed their goods 
on them, but it was as hard on the animals as on the men. 
Thousands of horses died in what came to be known as 
Dead Horse Gulch, and choked the trail with their car- 
casses. In the bogs beyond the summit, other thousands 
were mired and died. In fact, at times the trails became 
entirely choken with men, horses and supplies, and it was 
word of this and of the crimes committed that led many 
to go by the other routes. In the spring and summer rain 
would often fall for weeks in torrents, and the trails, 



118 Alaska, Our Beautil 



where not rocky would be deep in mud. In the winter 
there were the bHzzards and snow and low temperature, 
so that there was little choice. But summer and winter 
the hordes poured on. It is estimated that thirty thousand 
people and thirty million tons of supplies crossed these 
two passes in the days of the rush. 

The summit reached, almost as great difficulties loomed 
ahead. The trail wound along the small lakes and through 
the bogs of this section until Lake Bennett was reached. 
Horses, mules, dogs, goats, wheelbarrows, sleds with 
sails in the winter, everything that human ingenuity could 
devise to get the stampeders and their goods thus far 
was utilized. One woman clad in male attire — breeches, 
a mackinaw coat and moccasins — drove four goats at- 
tached to a sled upon which was the outfit of a laundry 
she intended starting in Dawson. A bride and groom, 
altogether ignorant of the kind of honeymoon trip they 
were starting upon, sent their goods ahead and brought 
with them only a small valise. They broke through the 
ice on one of the small lakes, were rescued by the mounted 
police and she came riding into Bennett dressed in the 
yellow striped pantaloons and the red jacket of her res- 
cuers. 

At Lake Bennett the crowd halted and set to making 
boats. The sound of wood chopping, the crash of falling 
trees, the noise of saws filled the air. The place hummed 
like some great shipyard. Nearly twenty thousand boats 
were built on the shores of this lake for the water trip to 
Dawson during the years of the rush. 

Few of the boat builders had had any experience in 
this work and the crafts put together were marvels of 
construction. They were triangular, oblong, flat, sphe- 
roidal, rectangular. They were all sizes, all thicknesses, 
and many travelled as well sideways as in any other 



The Dawson of Yesterday 119 

fashion. They were all built in hot haste by men eager 
to be off and who apparently had lost all sense of fear, 
else they never would have set forth in such craft for a 
voyage of an unknown number of miles on unknown 
waters. It is said that when the ice broke up on Lake 
Bennett as many as eight hundred of these boats set sail. 
They were filled with horses, cows, dogs, oxen, men, 
women, children, and supplies. They were so close to- 
gether they almost bumped each other, and forth they 
sailed, the strangest, weirdest procession of argonauts the 
world has ever known. Through Lake Bennett, past 
gusty Windy Arm, into Lake Marsh they went ; then into 
the jaws of Miles Canyon with its frowning walls and 
waters like a mill race, through the seething, foaming 
White Horse Rapids, on down through Lake Lebarge 
and the treacherous Thirtymile River with its rapids, 
shallows, concealed rocks that often broke a heavy scow 
into pieces as easily as if it were a clay pipe stem, on into 
the Lewes and Yukon and finally to their goal, Dawson, 
where boats ten and twelve deep were fastened to the 
river bank. 

Dawson, which when the first comers arrived was but a 
frozen swamp, quickly became like Skagway, a seething 
mass of humanity. A city of sixteen thousand people, 
named for Dr. George Dawson, Director of the Canadian 
Geological Survey, sprang rapidly into existence. It was 
a city of tents, of log houses, of frame buildings. The 
sound of hammers and saws filled the air, for the building 
of stores and houses was going on continuously. Many 
of the houses were extremely crude, for like the boats, 
they were built by men unaccustomed to house building. 
Window frames and glass were costly. A sash holding 
six panes, six inches by six inches, cost twenty-five dol- 
lars. Bottles, however, were plentiful, and empty stout 



120 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

and ale bottles were set in crude handmade window 
frames and gave a subdued light to the interior. Other 
uses were also made of these bottles. Table glasses were 
scarce. But a piece of stout cord or wire was heated, 
pressed tightly around the centre of the bottle, which was 
then dipped quickly into cold water, and it broke smoothly 
into two parts, one making a tumbler, the other a glass 
funnel. The people were resourceful and quick wits 
cleverly made up for the lack of material supplies. 

The Dawson bank of the early days was a tent with 
an unplaned board for a counter, and for a safe an old 
trunk filled with bags of gold dust. Currency was strewn 
all about and clerks in shirt sleeves attended to business. 

Men surged the streets eager to know about the mining 
on the creeks, anxious to get out and try their fortunes, 
or keenly studying the business situation in the newborn 
town and deciding to try their luck in some business ven- 
ture there. Men made fortunes and men lost every cent 
they possessed. " For one man who made, there were 
five hundred went broke," said an old timer telling of these 
days. " They were ruined financially and they were 
ruined in other ways. Their spirit was broken and that 
was the worst of all. I saw a man who had put every 
cent he had into a lot of cattle. Meat was high and he 
stood to make a fortune. He was bringing them on a 
boat through Lake Teslin. A storm came up. If the 
men with him had kept their heads they would have won 
out, but they got frightened and steered the boat for the 
shore. The bank was rocky, the barge was knocked to 
pieces and all the cattle drowned. The look on that man's 
face was awful to see. I'll never forget it as long as I 
live." 

" The ground was horribly rich, yes, horribly rich," 
said another reminiscently. " Sometimes the gold was 




< 



The Dawson of Yesterday 121 

so thick it was on the ground Hke the grains of wheat you 
throw out to the chickens. Many got a miUion dollars 
from a five hundred foot claim. From twenty-nine 
claims between fifty and sixty million dollars were taken. 
None of the men had ever had money like that before 
and when they got it in such amazing quantities they 
didn't know what to do with it. It went to their heads. 
They got plumb crazy. Their ideas of life, when they 
could live as they pleased, seemed to be to eat, drink, and 
indulge in all kinds of orgies. It got to be the fashion 
in the dance halls when an actress who was the rage was 
on to throw nuggets to her on the stage. Two miners 
were rivals with one girl, and one night they tried to 
outdo each other in showering her with gold. Finally 
one of them took out his entire poke and shouting ' Beat 
that, if you can,' tossed it to her. He died in the poor- 
house." 

So these stories go. A man who made a million is now 
working as a lumber jack in one of the camps in the 
States. It would seem as if almost all of those who 
quickly made these amazing fortunes, enduring untold 
hardship to acquire them, lost them just as quickly. 
Loaded down with bacon, flour, baking powder, coffee, 
sugar, a shovel, axe, blankets, possibly a Yukon stove, 
these men would trudge out to the hills through bogs and 
swamps in summer, or through bitter blizzards and tem- 
peratures of sixty and eighty degrees below in winter. 
They would cook their food on the shovel with which they 
dug. If they worked a few feet below ground, they had 
to thaw every inch of earth, and for this they must chop 
the necessary wood. The atmosphere of Bonanza, Eldo- 
rado, Hunker. Gold Run and other creeks was dense with 
choking smoke. They lived, many of them, in the most 
sordid surroundings, with unplaned planks for a table, 



122 Alaska, Our Beautiful HortMand 

with stools and bunks made out of logs and rough boards, 
with bedding unwashed for months, with dishes un- 
washed for days. Time was too precious for anything 
but mining. Often, in such cabins, seventy-five thou- 
sand dollars' worth of gold would be standing around in 
tin cans or lying about in bags, or even poured into old 
rubber boots, when all other receptacles were full. Then 
the day would come when they would go into town, and 
in saloons, gambling dens, and dance halls, their gold 
would trickle away, till, dead broke, they went back again 
to their sordid cabin, the fight with icy gravel, the life of 
loneliness and hardship to wrest once more the gleaming 
metal from the earth. 

Much better law and order were maintained in Dawson 
than in the usual mining camp. The town had its gam- 
bling places and dance halls. The Royal Alexandria 
Hotel of to-day is on the site of one of the most famous 
of these dance halls, and several others are still to be 
seen. But there was little theft or murder. The pres- 
ence of the Mounted Police and the quick justice meted 
criminals prevented this. If a man lost his money, and 
countless numbers did, it was because he gambled it 
away or threw it away on dance hall favorites. 

When a man went into a gambling den or saloon, he 
handed his poke to the man at the door. When he came 
out, he showed the score of his indebtedness, the amount 
was taken out of the poke and the remainder handed 
back. It did not take long to clean a man out by this 
process. The dance halls girls and attendants likewise 
had schemes for parting a miner and his poke. Box 
rushing was one of these. The upper part of the play- 
house contained rows of boxes. Between acts, the 
actresses would rush up to these boxes and induce their 
occupants to treat. For this the actress was slipped a 



The Dawson of Yesterday 123 

small ticket by the waiter which entitled her to twenty- 
five per cent of the money paid for the drinks. One 
night one man paid seven hundred and fifty dollars for 
cigars, three thousand dollars for drinks, and owed 
another thousand. 

One man who was in Dawson during these days said 
in explanation of this recklessness, " Men were in some 
respects like boys. They threw ofi^ all restraint. At a 
dance, two judges made a bet as to which could outdance 
the other. They would never have thought of doing 
such a thing elsewhere. But here they were free to do 
absolutely as they pleased. One danced on one foot while 
he took off his other shoe. Then he repeated the per- 
formance till he was barefooted, and being thus able to 
dance with less fatigue, won." 

Food was high. Sugar was seventy-five dollars a sack, 
flour one dollar a pound, candles one dollar and a quar- 
ter each, eggs eighteen dollars a dozen. One man paid 
two hundred dollars for a crate of frozen potatoes. " I 
hadn't tasted a potato for two years," he said with a 
gleam of the eye as if he were again enjoying those frozen 
tubers. " I tell you, they tasted good." 

If funds ran low and money could not be borrowed, 
clever wits usually devised some way to get a start. 
During the Spanish-American war no papers had been 
received for several weeks. One man happened to get 
one by first-class m.ail. He read to the crowd about the 
post office a few choice items and then announced he 
would read the rest from a hall nearby at one dollar each 
for admission. Five hundred men crowded in. 

The lines at the post office when mail came in became 
famous. They would stretch for blocks and continue for 
days, and many a man in a hurry paid twenty dollars 
for a place near the window. 



124 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

But life had its comedies as well as its tragedies and 
toil. The ownership of one of the claims on the rich 
Bonanza Creek had lapsed and two men re-staked it 
simultaneously; the one, however, who filed first would 
get it. Their stakes driven, they started pell mell for 
Fortymile, the recording place some sixty or so miles 
away. Down Bonanza Creek they fled on foot until 
Dawson was reached. Here friends of each who knew 
the effort being made had dog teams ready and away 
each flew. The office of Fortymile closed at four o'clock 
and each was eager to reach it before this hour, for there 
was no conjecturing what might happen before it opened 
next morning. Passing and re-passing, jockeying for the 
best road, on they whirled. When within two or three 
miles of the office, the dogs of one began to flag. No 
urging or whipping could speed them up. Seeing the 
other about to pass, out leaped their driver and started 
on a run for the goal. He soon outdistanced the dogs 
of the other team now beginning to be spent. Not to be 
beaten, the driver of these leaped out and began to run. 
Neck and neck they reached Fortymile, spent and pant- 
ing for breath. One of the men not being familiar with 
the town and seeing a large building made for it. The 
other who knew the Recording Office turned, reached the 
door, opened it, and fell exhausted on the threshold, but 
managed to shout, " Sixty above on Bonanza." The 
other, who had realized his mistake when his opponent 
turned, had followed, was close on his heels, and drowned 
his rival's voice with his shout, " Sixty above on Bo- 
nanza." 

The recorder decided the race was a tie and advised 
them to divide the claim, which they finally did. When 
they came to work it, it was worthless. 

Another miner known as Charlie the Finn had located 



The Dawson of Yesterday 125 

a claim on Ready Bullion Creek but had not yet recorded 
it. He boasted, however, long and loud about its value 
and what he expected to do with the millions he would 
get out of it. Some of the other miners became tired of 
hearing these tales and decided to have a little fun with 
Charlie. When only a few days remained of the time 
allowed him for recording, two strangers appeared in 
the saloon where Charlie as usual was holding forth in 
regard to his future gains. After a drink or so the bar 
tender asked the men the usual queries as to how they 
were doing. In secretive tones, but quite loud enough 
for Charlie to hear, they told of having just come in 
from Ready Bullion where they had struck something 
that would make Bonanza look like a two-cent piece. As 
Charlie heard snatches of their talk, and recalled how 
his own claim on this creek was not recorded, he soon 
lost all interest in the tale he was telling. He strained 
his ears to catch more of their talk. Others crowded 
about them and finally one of the newcomers asked, 
" Who owns Claim Six? I have tried to get some of the 
claims but can't. I'm told this isn't filed. If it isn't, 
I am going right out to stake and file." 

This was too much for Charlie, for this was his claim. 
He ran from the saloon, rushed to his cabin, seized some 
cold pancakes, all that was left from his last meal, and 
started on a run for Fortymile. A miner coming in to 
Dawson a few hours later said he had met a crazy man 
running as if for life, with some frozen pancakes in one 
hand and his cap in the other, and that all he could get 
out of him as he rushed past was, " Number Six, Ready 
Bullion. Struck it rich." 

It is said that whenever Charlie was asked about the 
afifair afterward the language he used made the ques- 
tioner wish he had not brought up the subject. 



126 Alaska, Onr BeantiM Northland 

A tale is told of two men who were earnestly solicited 
by a clergyman to attend a church service. Finally they 
consented. The service was conducted with all the cere- 
monies of the Church of England, carried out as well as it 
could be in those times and circumstances. The two old 
prospectors had not been to church since they were boys 
and they intently watched the proceedings, looking with 
much amazement at the choir boys, the incense, and the 
other parts of the service. Finally one turned to the other 

and said, " This is the queerest thing I ever saw. 

Look at that bunch with white parkas on burning a 
smudge in the middle of winter." 

The Christmas of '96 when the news of Carmack's 
discovery had brought miners from all near-by creeks, 
though the great rush had not yet set in, was uniquely 
celebrated. There were a few women in the town and 
they determined to properly honor the season. There 
was no log cabin or house large enough to accommodate 
the crowd, so the women appealed to a saloon keeper for 
the use of his place of business. Though it meant the 
loss to him of his richest season, he cordially consented 
and ofifered to put blankets in front of the bar to make 
the place look better. He stopped all gambling and gave 
his establishment over to the women entirely. 

The women then went to work to get contributions for 
the expenses, and in a temperature of fifty below trudged 
about soliciting gold dust, articles for decoration, and 
whatever would help to the success of the affair. Min- 
ers' bags, trunks, and knapsacks were ransacked for 
decorative articles, and out came pictures of the queen, 
of the president, of the pope, of prize fighters, and of 
ballet girls. One man had a flag, and another who could 
draw scoured Dawson for wrapping paper and made ap- 
propriate Christmas sketches to lend an air of gayety. 



The Dawson of Yesterday 127 

When Christmas Eve arrived from far and near the 
crowd came. Miners trudged through the snow and cold 
ten and twenty miles. It was a black night with a bliz- 
zard blowing, but they came — men absolutely illiterate, 
men who had graduated from Oxford, lawyers, doctors, 
men of many professions and of none, men who had 
lived in the wilds for years and had not known a Christ- 
mas celebration since they were young. Many were 
unshaven. Many had hair falling to their shoulders 
Clothing of every kind was worn. 

A selection was read from the Bible, a short address 
was made, and then old, familiar hymns were sung. At 
the conclusion of each, cheers shook the roof, stout boots 
stamped the floor, big fists pounded the benches, and 
voices cried, " Hit 'em again! " " That's bully! " " Keep 
her up ! " 

The next day the Christmas dinner was spread. Boards 
were laid across barrels, the diners sat on boxes, kegs and 
benches. There was no table cloth, but sprigs of pine 
trees gave a bright, cheery note to the board. The miners 
had brought their own cups, plates, spoons, knives and 
forks. The women who had arranged the affair and 
their husbands were the waiters. 

Baked beans, stewed codfish, baked salmon, stewed 
prunes, tarts made of dried apples and condensed milk, 
composed the menu, not much like a Christmas dinner 
but ambrosia to the diners because of the surroundings 
and the spirit of the affair. Cigars and pipes followed, 
and then some one suggested that contributions be taken 
for a hospital, for there had been much scurvy and 
typhoid, and in ten minutes more than ten thousand dol- 
lars were raised. 

An old sailor had brought a battered violin, and he 
squeaked out familiar tunes, and everybody sang. Two 



128 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Frenchmen sang the " Marseillaise," Then some one 
started the " Star Spangled Banner " and though few 
knew the words, everybody hummed the tune. Then 
came " God Save the Queen." Stories and speeches fol- 
lowed until the candles sputtered in their homemade 
sockets and good nights had to be said. 

The creeks around Dawson have yielded more than a 
hundred million dollars in gold and the output still con- 
tinues. The work was hard. The ground had to be 
thawed, a slow, tedious process. If the windlass and 
bucket method was used, one man worked below with 
pick and shovel, another drew the bucket up. If a man 
was working the claim himself, he had to perform both 
operations, climbing out of the shaft every time a bucket 
was ready to be drawn up. One man from St. Louis, 
who had a mortgage on his home, was long remembered 
as one of the tireless workers. 

The names given the creeks are stories in themselves. 
These names are still retained, and as one hears them 
the panorama of those old days unrolls before one. 
Sourdough, King Solomon, Monte Cristo, American, 
Cheechako, Skookum, Gold Hill, Irish, French, Bonanza, 
so the list runs. Through them one glimpses the nation- 
ality or the temperament of those who for several years 
centred the eyes of the world on these hills and valleys 
lying in the shadow of the Arctic. 



CHAPTER X 

DAWSON TO FAIRBANKS 

Famous Fortymile. Into American territory. Eagle and 
Circle city. The midnight sun. Fort Yukon and its 
interesting history. farming on the arctic circle, 

The RAMPARTS OF THE YUKON. TaNANA, CITY AND RIVER. 

Nenana. Fairbanks. 

As the steamer glides gently from Its dock at Dawson a 
beautiful scene lies ahead. The lower end of the town 
where are the neat buildings of St. Mary's Hospital ends 
in a rocky point running out into the river and from this 
a sheer mountain rises majestically. The channel nar- 
rows, and ahead, the shining stream seems to run directly 
into a bowl or craterlike cup in the hills. But the river 
deftly turns, glides swiftly between these high mountain 
walls and swings out into broader spaces. 

This part of the river also makes its contribution to 
Yukon history. At Fortymile, so called because it was 
forty miles from Fort Reliance, the trading post near the 
present site of Dawson, gold was discovered as early as 
1886. Indeed, the Fortymilers stand out in Yukon his- 
tory almost as do the Forty-niners in Calif ornian annals. 
Fortymile is the oldest gold camp in the North. Many of 
the problems of mining in the Arctic were worked out 
here by the early comers, for these first miners had to 
overcome frozen gravels and many other difficulties of 
mining not encountered elsewhere, and their experiences 
and the methods evolved were of value to those who came 
later. 

120 



130 Alaska, Our Beautiful NortMand 

The Fortymile River, on which the miners worked and 
at whose mouth the trading post was estabhshed and a 
Httle settlement came into being, is a picturesque stream 
full of twists and curves. In some places it has been 
called the Kink because of its windings. The stream is 
an unfailing source even yet of grubstakes for miners. 
For miles the bars of the river still yield a harvest and 
hither come miners who are " broke " to rock out enough 
for a fresh start. The winter is usually the harvest sea- 
son for these workers and by spring they have cleaned 
up enough to buy an outfit for a trip over the hills into 
new country. 

The river is very shallow over the bars and freezes to 
the bottom. The ice is removed, the gravel is thawed 
and then rocked out in the tent, the water for the purpose 
being heated on the camper's Yukon stove. In the early 
days, before the river had been so thoroughly worked 
as it is at present, from five to one hundred dollars a day 
was washed out. Game, fish and wild berries were 
plentiful and it was a good camp. 

Curious things have happened in this camp. One 
claim that paid its owner richly was known as the 
" Graveyard." The first man to die on the creek was 
buried in this piece of ground because it was thought to 
be utterly worthless. But paystreak was struck, the body 
moved, and the owner of the ground became wealthy. 
The history of gold mining in the North is full of such 
accidental discoveries. 

On some of the small creeks emptying into Fortymile 
River coal has been found. The coal and gold are some- 
times mixed. One miner states that some of his richest 
" pans " were accompanied by coal and that gold has often 
been picked out of coal seams. Coal is sorted out of the 
tailings in summer to sharpen the miners' picks and also 



Dawson to Fairbanks 131 

to be used as fuel under boilers. In some places the 
underground coal at times burns and the ground gets so 
hot even in winter as to burn the feet. One miner had 
his moccasins destroyed in this way. On some creeks 
in the district magnetic iron ore has also been discovered. 

At one time a mission flourished at Fortymile under 
the care of Bishop Bompas, who was a son of Sergeant 
Bompas of the English bar from whom Charles Dickens 
drew his character of Buzfuz counsel for the plaintiff 
in the famous suit of Bardell vs. Pickwick. For nearly a 
half century Bishop Bompas labored as a missionary 
among the Indians of the Yukon and Mackenzie Rivers. 

Fortymile is little now but a roadhouse, store, barracks, 
customs house and a few other buildings. 
. Beyond this point the international boundary is soon 
reached and American territory is entered. To many, all 
this section is Alaska, for as William Ogilvie, director 
of the government surveying staff and later governor or 
commissioner of the Yukon, says in his book, " Early 
Days on the Yukon," " The United States Territory of 
Alaska and the Yukon Territory of Canada are so inti- 
mately associated in the public mind that few except 
scholars or students think of them as separate." In Daw- 
son, unless some act specially connected with Canadian 
regulations such as posting a letter brings the thought to 
mind, one rarely is conscious that he is in British ter- 
ritory. 

Eagle is an attractive little town even though there are 
but few buildings. The custom house, court house, 
stores, church, and a scattering of houses comprise the 
settlement. More of these are painted than is usually 
the case in these settlements, which, perhaps, helps to 
make the pleasing impression. The town is located in 
a rather flat, tree-covered stretch with snow mountains 



132 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



showing in the distance. Fort Egbert near by was, at one 
time, maintained by the government but it has been aban- 
doned. It was located on the site of an old trading post 
founded by a French Canadian and called Belle Isle. 

The first United States district court was established 
at Eagle but later it was removed to Fairbanks. When 
the court was still here, the fort occupied, and miners 
pouring in by way of the Yukon the future of Eagle 
looked exceedingly bright, and when the initial surveys 
were made by the government for roads and trails, one 
was mapped out from Valdez on the Pacific through the 
interior to Eagle. But it was never completed. The 
gold strike came at Fairbanks and interest was diverted 
to the interior. 

Making a landing at many of these little towns is often 
an interesting and curious proceeding. The steamer 
apparently heads up stream, though it has been going 
down, and then drifts down backward and swings into 
the river bank, which is the only landing. The perform- 
ance seems clumsy and helpless, but the captain knows 
what he is about, and the passengers watch with keen 
interest this seemingly blundering but nevertheless sure 
landing. There are no docks or piers. There is just 
the river bank several feet, sometimes several yards, high. 
The boat runs in very close, sometimes almost scraping it. 
The gang plank is thrown from the boat to the bluff, 
often if there is but little to go ashore, a newspaper per- 
haps and two or three small packages, these are tossed to 
those on the bank and the steamer goes on its way. 

Another novel feature of this river trip is taking on 
wood, or " wooding up," as it is called. Most of the 
steamers burn wood, and along the river at certain points 
are great stacks of wood neatly piled. The steamer 
glides up to the bank, a gang plank is thrown ashore and 



Dawson to Fairbanks 133 

the wood wheeled on in hand trucks and barrows. While 
this is being done the passengers go ashore and pick wild 
berries and flowers. Some of the little grassy meadows 
at these points are thick with wild roses, bluebells, and 
dozens of other lovely blossoms. From fifteen to twenty- 
five cords are taken on at a landing. It is a low grade 
brittle spruce wood with, in some places, a little hemlock. 
In winter, when the frost is in it, one crack of the axe 
will split a spruce log open. The boats between Dawson 
and Fairbanks burn on an average one cord an hour. 
The larger boats burn two cords. 

From Eagle on, the river scenery for many miles has 
a grandeur and beauty that is unique. The banks of the 
river rise in sheer walls, their tops level as a board, their 
fronts eroded into a succession of rounded bluffs with 
deep canyons and gorges between filled with spruce and 
hemlock. Far away in the background can be seen 
ranges of snow mountains. This formation runs for 
miles and gives a peculiarly weird, impressive beauty to 
the landscape. In some places the rounded bluffs grow 
more jagged and rise into a succession of rugged peaks. 
The river is narrow, swift and mud colored. Not a sign 
of human habitation is to be seen. For countless miles 
is only the primeval wilderness, and one seems to be 
gliding swiftly through a new and strange world. 

Just below Eagle the rock strata of one of the bluffs 
has the appearance of a piece of dress goods and the 
bank here has been called Calico Bluff. 

Circle is the next settlement. In 1896 it proclaimed 
itself to be the largest log cabin town in the world, but 
to-day it has little to boast of either in population or 
area. On the river bank awaiting the boat were a hand- 
ful of white people, among them a few boys in khaki and 
an Indian with a pappoose on her back. The log build- 



134 Alas 



ings of the Northern Commercial Company, the N. C. 
as it is cohoquially called, and a few other stores and log 
houses constitute the town. The melancholy howling of 
malemute dogs filled the air. 

The Northern Commercial Company, whose buildings 
are seen in almost all towns in Alaska, is the outgrowth 
of some of the old trading companies of this region. 
When Alaska was purchased from Russia by the United 
States the Russian Company's trading posts were ac- 
quired by a San Francisco firm. A few years later an 
independent company was incorporated which established 
posts along the Yukon River and engaged Harper, Mc- 
Questen and Mayo as their agents. In a few years this 
company bought out the San Francisco firm, later merged 
with another company doing business here and became 
known as the Northern Commercial Company. To-day 
their big warehouses are dotted all through Alaska and 
it is the largest and most successful trading company in 
the North. 

Circle is the outgrowth of a trading post established 
by McQuesten when gold was discovered in this vicinity. 
The town was supposed to be on the Arctic Circle but 
this latitude is not yet reached for some eighty miles. 
But almost anywhere hereabouts the phenomenon of the 
midnight sun can be seen and hither come the " Sunners " 
for their view of it. 

It is worth the trip, for it is a sight never to be for- 
"•otten; another of the strange, beautiful and unusual 
experiences Alaska has in store for those who come to 
her. Slowly, in a sky of gold the sun sinks almost to 
the horizon. The water is a great shining pathway of 
gold and in this glory two small islands are darkly 
silhouetted. Down, down, ahiiost to the water's edge 
drops the great globe, hesitates there a few moments, as if 




s s 



Dawson to Fairbanks 135 

undecided whether to go to bed or to go to work again, 
and then, having made up his mind, slowly moves in seem- 
ingly almost a straight line along the horizon for a brief 
space and then slowly begins to rise. Sometimes the 
colors are different. There may be a glory of rose and 
purple, for nature has such an unlimited palette of colors 
she rarely needs to use the same hue twice. But however 
she paints the sky and water, the work will always be 
exquisite in tinting, and the sight of the great globe of 
light sinking in this glory of color and then slowly rising 
again to resume its duties is so weird, so strange, that 
one again wonders if he is on the familiar earth or 
transported to some other sphere. 

At Circle the Yukon Flats begin and the river loses 
its picturesque banks. It widens till it seems like a great 
inland sea with islands here and there green with spruce, 
with channels everywhere. It is a maze of waterways 
bewildering to the eye, with logs and tree trunks and 
roots floating in it like the wreckage of some destructive 
flood. The shores become in places mere dim lines on 
the horizon for the river at times is ten miles or so wide. 
These flats extend for some two hundred miles, and navi- 
gation on this part of the river is extremely difficult owing 
to the constant changes in the channel by reason of new 
bars forming, banks eroding, islands appearing and dis- 
appearing. 

Fort Yukon, the next stopping place, is on the Arctic 
Circle, which may be the cause of its being a trifle more 
pretentious than the other settlements, though this is more 
likely due to the fact that Fort Yukon is the oldest Eng- 
lish speaking settlement on the upper river. It was 
established in 1846 by Alexander Murray, a factor of 
the Hudson Bay Company. While Campbell was com- 
ing down the Pelly and making his plans for Fort Sel- 



136 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

kirk, Murray crossed the Arctic plain to the Porcupine, 
came down this river, which empties into the Yukon here, 
and founded a trading post at the junction a year or so 
before Campbell completed Fort Selkirk. It was said 
to be the best built trading post in these northern wilds, 
to have had glazed windows, plastered walls, and to have 
been unusually attractive and comfortable for the wilder- 
ness. But one is inclined to be a bit skeptical as to the 
glazed windows, unless the traders evolved some method 
of making them on the spot. Window glass some fifty 
years later at Dawson was a luxury. To get it to Fort 
Yukon would mean an overland trip from Montreal. 
Perhaps the windows were evolved from bottles, as many 
were in Dawson. 

However, it was an important post and, when Fort 
Selkirk was burned, became the chief Hudson Bay post 
on the river. Here, in 1862, came Archdeacon McDon- 
ald, of the Church of England, for missionary work 
among the natives. He studied the Indian language, ex- 
tracted its grammar, and translated the Bible, Book of 
Common Prayer, and some of the hymns into the native 
tongue. He also taught the Indians to read and write 
in their native language. He labored faithfully among 
them for many years. It is thus one of the oldest mis- 
sionary stations with the exception of those of the 
Russians on the lower river, on the Yukon, and it is to-day 
the site of a flourishing mission of the Protestant Epis- 
copal church. 

A roadhouse, a wireless station, log houses, frame 
buildings and the hospital of the mission make an at- 
tractive settlement. The log hospital is quite the most 
impressive looking building. It has many windows, 
dainty white curtains and a glimpse of flowers within. 
It seems perilously near the bank considering how many 



Dawson to Fairbanks 137 

places have been washed away and that some of the 
houses connected with the mission station here have 
already gone into the waters of the Yukon. Upon his 
return from his latest trip to the Arctic, Stefansson was 
taken care of here while recuperating. 

One of nature's totem poles, a tree with excrescences 
resembling the human face, has been set up in a yard. A 
little carving has helped along the likeness to human fea- 
tures and to still further carry this out a cigar has been 
stuck in the mouth. 

Near the settlement is the Old Hudson Bay cemetery 
in which are the oldest known graves of white people on 
the Yukon. 

When the United States purchased Alaska from Rus- 
sia this Hudson Bay post had to move. There was then 
so little accurate knowledge as to where the boundary 
between the British and American possessions really was 
that the post had to move twice before it finally reached 
British territory, and the last location seemed a matter 
of luck more than knowledge for it chanced to be over 
the line but a few miles. 

The country around Fort Yukon is flat with willows 
and poplars and a few spruce for greenery. 

An up river boat is passed here and mail handed to it 
for a quicker trip outside than the down boat gives. Ac- 
quaintances exchange the popular greeting in Alaska, 
" Are you going out? " or " Are you in for some time? " 
for " inside " and " outside " are the two terms in Alaska 
to designate life in the Territory and life in the States. 
" It sounds like jail," one passenger laughingly remarked, 
as he heard some one ask, " How long are you in for? " 
and another, " When do you get out? " 

The breaking up of the ice in the spring which sweeps 
, away the river banks and the houses, a sample of whose 



138 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

destructive power is seen at Fort Yukon in the carrying 
away of one of the mission buildings, is a sight quite as 
well worth seeing as the midnight sun, if the season were 
as favorable. The ice in all sorts of fantastic shapes, 
" like houses on end," one describes it, moves in stately 
fashion down stream. Sometimes the whole body stops 
perfectly still and lies in the river without motion. Then 
the wind springs up and it begins to move. Around 
rocky points it sweeps, the rock splintering the ice into 
fine spray like salt that rises geyserlike in a snowy column 
sometimes thirty feet high. 

At all the towns along the river the people gather to 
see the sight. It is not only a majestic spectacle but it 
IS an event of importance for it means the opening of 
spring and summer business. Each year in these towns, 
bets are freely made as to the date when the ice will go 
out, and sometimes pools are formed running into thou- 
sands of dollars. In Dawson the event is timed by aid 
of a wire cable fastened to a prominent pedestal set on 
the ice midway between the shores. The wire is attached 
to an electric stop-clock ashore. 

Some eighty miles beyond Fort Yukon is Beaver where 
a sign reads, " Government road to Caro, Coldfoot and 
Bettles," and one has a mental picture of a trail winding 
over vast, lonely stretches of mountain and woods and 
tundra into the great Arctic wilderness. 

Rampart, the next stop, has more than usual interest. 
In appearance it is much like other settlements being but 
a little group of log houses, but in one of these cabins 
lived Rex Beach, the writer of Alaskan stories, and across 
the river can be seen the neatly painted buildings of the 
government agricultural experiment stations, the fields 
green with crops, the whole place looking much like a 
prosperous little farm in New Jersey or the Middle West. 



Dawson to Fairbanks 139 

The hills slope up rather noticeably back of Rampart 
and through them runs a trail to Hot Springs near Fair- 
banks. The distance by this trail is about seventy miles, 
whereas by the river it is several hundred. 

At one of the stops along here a woman missionary 
came on board who had travelled five hundred miles in a 
row boat to get a steamer for the outside. Her experi- 
ence is somewhat akin to that of one of the drafted men 
during the war. He was told to take the nearest train 
and report at once. The nearest train happened to be 
twelve hundred miles distant. He travelled by dog team, 
canoe, launch and steamer to reach it and was several 
months on the way. Alaska is a country of distances, a 
fact some people do not realize. The trip down the 
Yukon from its navigable headwaters to its mouth is 
more than two thousand miles. 

The Yukon Ramparts begin here, and after the Flats 
it is pleasant to see green hills and bluffs again. The 
shores are clothed with spruce, poplar and willow. In 
some places the bluffs are steep and shaped by wind and 
water into bastionlike effects that give much the appear- 
ance of a staunchly built fort. The walls are sculptured 
with all sorts of weird traceries suggestive of Egyptian 
heads and hieroglyphics. Again the banks rise into 
mighty bluffs that seem to close the river in and make a 
landlocked harbor ahead. But always the swift current 
has worked a way through and swings around a sharp 
curve into a gleaming waterway ahead. 

The first indication of Tanana, the most important 
town on this part of the river, is the little Indian village 
and mission with its church and homes and gardens, all 
very neat and attractive, and a little graveyard amidst 
the trees and grasses. Then the town itself comes into 
view, consisting mostly of one street running along the 



140 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

river with a few houses scattered back from the water 
among the grasses and wild flowers and trees, and at the 
far end of the town, on the river bank, the cheerful yellow 
buildings of Fort Gibbon. 

The impression the town gives is pleasing. Flowers 
are indoors and out. One home boasted a tiny hothouse ; 
another, of logs, had a bird house at the peak. Some of 
the log houses have green corrugated iron roofs very 
pretty in effect and at a distance looking like soft green 
moss. A town bulletin board announced essential news, 
and the jail was such an extremely comfortable-looking 
place that one felt were a stay in the town necessary it 
would be well to commit some misdemeanor that one 
might be lodged and fed here. A horse was grazing in 
a lot filled to overflowing with the pinkest of wild roses 
and the bluest of Scotch bluebells while a marvellous blue 
sky arched overhead, spruce framed in the background 
and the great swift river rolled in front. One could but 
wonder if he appreciated the beauty of his dining-room. 

Fort Gibbon, at the lower end of the town, is most at- 
tractively situated with the broad Yukon in front and 
distant mountains filling the horizon behind. It is a 
pleasant place of cheery yellow buildings with red roofs, 
a spacious parade ground, a telegraph office and post 
exchange, a moving picture theatre to which the towns- 
folks are admitted upon payment of twenty-five cents, 
and the usual commissary and store houses. 

Tanana, or rather its site, was in the early days a great 
trading point for natives from up the Tanana River, 
from the Koyukuk, and from the upper and lower Yukon. 
It had an unspellable and unpronounceable Indian name 
meaning " between the rivers," which is probably why 
" Tanana " has been substituted for it. Later, when the 
Russians established their posts on the lower river and 



Dawson to Fairbanks 141 

the Hudson Bay Company on the upper, the traders of 
these two companies joined the gatherings of the Indians. 
Down the river in large, flat-bottomed boats loaded with 
guns, blankets, powder, tea, tobacco and such articles 
came the Hudson Bay men, and up the river with their 
goods came the Russian agents. It was at these meet- 
ings that the discovery was made that the Yukon of 
the Hudson Bay people and the Kwikpak of the Russians 
were one stream. 

At Tanana the Yukon River is left by those who go to 
Fairbanks and the steamer turns up the Tanana River, 
another of the large, important rivers of the Territory. 
The name means. " River of mountains." It is some five 
hundred miles long and drains a section not only rich in 
minerals but with great agricultural possibilities. When 
the Territory comes into its full development this river 
will become one of its great business arteries, for down 
it will come agricultural products for settlements both 
up and down the Yukon and also merchandise shipped in 
over the government railroad from the seaboard. 

A very gentle landscape greets the traveller as the boat 
turns in, a scene of broad waters, low shores green with 
willow and poplar, low flat tree-covered islands, and far 
off on the horizon a faint line of blue mountains. 

Sometimes the mountains come closer but they are 
gentle slopes covered with trees. Again the shores 
spread out into flats green with grass with here and there 
pools throwing back the reflections of the grasses and 
wild flowers on their banks. Then will come stretches 
of dense spruce forests. The steamer, at times, runs 
close to the shore and one can look far into the depths 
of these woods with their dark shadows lighted here and 
there with flickering shafts of sunlight. At times islands 
dot the water, or the shore line runs out into sharp points 



142 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



and far away mountains are glimpsed. At some points, 
on clear days, Mt. McKinley can be seen. 

The current is swift, the earth of the banks soft, and 
it melts in the water like sugar in coffee. Earth and 
trees and grass and flowers are constantly falling in and 
all along where the banks have been undermined, they 
overhang the water forming earth caves below. Whether 
the scene strikes one as a picture of loneliness and desola- 
tion or as a glimpse of the primeval it must be admitted 
to be unique. 

A stop is made at Tolovana, a settlement consisting 
of a store and a few log houses. It is a point of shipment 
to mines in the interior, by means of a boat which runs 
some eighty miles up the Tolovana River to Log Jam. 

Nenana is next reached, a town that leaped into prom- 
inence with the coming of the government railroad from 
Seward and Anchorage. Previous to the advent of the 
railroad Nenana consisted, according to report, of Jimmy 
Duke and St. Mark's Mission. But these are entirely 
overshadowed now by the neat, green and white buildings 
of the government, bright new stores, and, most impor- 
tant of all, the railroad cars with the big letters, " U. S." 
in white paint on their green sides, tangible evidence of 
government ownership of the railroads that gives a thrill 
to those who have longed to see it. 

Substantial looking warehouses stretch along the water 
front. The mess house, storehouses, hospital and cot- 
tages of the Alaska Engineering Commission, all painted 
dark green and white, come next, and then the streets 
and stores of the town, broad streets, bright shining new 
shops and hotels and restaurants and laundries and 
homes. For the Nenana of to-day is a new town but a 
few years old with the forest crowding close upon its out- 
skirts and everything shining with the lustre of newness. 



Dawson to Fairbanks 143 

The absence of the usual numerous Alaskan dog is 
noticeable and it is discovered that he is not allowed 
within a mile of the town. One sees him in the Indian 
village near by but tied and disconsolate and reproachful. 

Beyond Nenana is Chena, which expected to be the 
metropolis of interior AlaslA instead of Fairbanks and 
by reason of its location felt it should be. It is on the 
river, and was the terminus of the Tanana Valley Rail- 
road, a small railroad running from Fairbanks to various 
mining camps round about and now a part of the govern- 
ment road. When the government road became an 
assured fact and Chena felt its development certain, it 
elevated the prices of its real estate and beamingly 
awaited its gold mines in the boom that was to come. 
But it over-reached itself. The prices asked were beyond 
reason and opportunity indignantly marched by and up 
the slough to Fairbanks, the Golden Heart of Alaska, as 
it is called. 

So the boat likewise passes by Chena with a stop of 
perhaps a few minutes and steams on up the slough to 
Alaska's chief interior city. 

The course up the slough is devious. A small child 
voiced the sentiment of many among the passengers when 
she exclaimed, " It's the most windable river I ever saw." 
Willows and alders clothe the low banks. A dog ranch 
is occasionally seen, a rather unattractive looking place, 
where dogs are boarded during their summer idleness. 
Then Fairbanks comes into view, the tall wireless station, 
the green fields of its government experimental farm, 
showing first, and then, as the town is neared, the boats 
along its busy water front, the iron bridge that spans 
the slough, the hotels and stores appearing, all arousing 
keen expectations as to what this city in the heart of this 
vast country is like. 



CHAPTER XI 

fairbanks, the golden heart of alaska 

The discovery of gold that created Fairbanks. Early days. 
The modern city of to-day. Near-by farms and their 
PROSPERITY. Fairbanks' bright future. A trip to the 

CREEKS. 

Fairbanks, like many Alaskan cities, is the result of 
the discovery of gold. But it has no spectacular history 
like Dawson or Nome. True, it had its rush, but it 
never held the attention of the world as dramatically as 
did these other two. 

In 1901, Fairbanks was a small trading station consist- 
ing, like most of these, of a few log houses and stores. 
Here, prospectors making their way from the coast, or up 
the river from the Yukon, or over the mountains to Daw- 
son, stopped for supplies. Then Felix Pedro found gold 
on a near-by creek. It is an odd coincidence that several 
seasons before, when going through this section with a 
few comrades on their way to Circle, Pedro found gold. 
But the party was in an almost starved condition, there 
was no trading post then, and haste had to be made. So 
the gold was abandoned. In fact Pedro did not even 
take sufficient note of it to remember the exact location. 
Other miners, hearing of his discovery, tried to locate 
the rimrock he had sighted but were not successful. It 
was not until 1902 when he returned, brought possibly 
by the memory of his former discovery, and again found 
gold, that the rush in this district started. Whether this 
paystreak was the same as his original discovery neither 
he nor any one else knew. 

144 



Fairbanks, the Golden Heart of Alaska 145 

Two fairly well-stocked trading posts were near now 
owing to the building of the government military lines 
through this section, and Pedro this time did not suffer. 
He was able to work his claim and did so well with it 
that the news soon spread and men came from Valdez, 
Nome, Dawson and from up and down the Yukon. They 
camped on the river bank, they lived in tents, they lived 
in the open. Houses and buildings went up as rapidly 
as possible. The place was the usual mining camp scene 
of bustle and confusion, of high prices for a time, of 
gambling dens and dance halls. Sandwiches cost a dollar 
each. Yukon stoves, " just a piece of tin bent into 
shape," said a woman describing these early days, " and 
with a little arrangement for a draft/' brought forty-five 
dollars. Baking powder biscuits were two dollars a dozen. 
But these prices only controlled for a short time. There 
was not the reckless throwing away of money as at Daw- 
son. Although the district is rich and has yielded a 
tremendous amount of gold, more than sixty-six millions 
having been mined here in thirteen years, the individual 
fortunes have not been so great as at Dawson. The 
men made less, saved it, and often, when a considerable 
sum had been secured, went back to the States to enjoy 
it. In fact the gamblers who had come expecting to 
reap the usual harvest went out disappointed and spread 
some of the hard luck tales that made the camp at one 
time seem to be a failure. 

The town was incorporated in 1903 and a government 
by mayor and city council established. In 1904 the fed- 
eral offices were removed from Eagle and a federal judge 
came. In 1907 the city government stepped in and 
closed the dance halls and gambling places and confis- 
cated the gambling outfits. 

The city to-day is far from having the appearance of 



146 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

a mining camp. It is a busy, bustling town with many 
banks, hotels, stores, restaurants, laundries and all that 
goes to make a prosperous business community. It has 
electric lights, telephones, telegraph, a jitney service to 
the near-by creeks and mining towns and a service of 
several small boats and launches up and down the Tanana 
River. A government bureau of mines is located here 
with a well-equipped laboratory. The government also 
has an experimental farm within a few miles of the town 
where vegetables, fruits and grains suitable for raising 
in Alaska are tested out. On this farm, ground has been 
broken for the Alaska Agricultural College and School 
of Mines and the buildings are in course of erection. The 
town has also many churches, a public library and a good 
school. 

This school has a corps of eight teachers and com- 
prises all grades from the fifth to the high school includ- 
ing manual training and domestic science. There are 
physical and chemical laboratories with the necessary 
apparatus and it is no easy matter to equip these labor- 
atories when it is remembered that the base of supplies 
is more than a thousand miles away, that goods are some- 
times on the road six months and more and that when 
they finally do arrive some essential part is quite likely 
to be missing and ingenuity must be taxed to supply it. 
No large shipments can be brought in during the winter 
as all supplies must come overland by sled, and no matter 
how important a part of some laboratory apparatus may 
be lacking, it cannot be secured until spring or rather 
summer arrives and the river is open. The supplies for 
the entire year for the whole community must also be 
brought in during these summer months and stored. 

Tlie school-house is a large, modern building with a 
fine outdoor playground equipped with swings, seesaws, 



Fairbanks, the Golden Heart of Alaska 147 

toboggans, rings and other apparatus for healthy sport. 
The children enjoy these even in the winter. The tem- 
perature has to be extremely low to keep them from their 
outdoor play. The Fairbanks youngsters do not mind 
cold weather. Many little tots walk a mile and more to 
come to school with the temperature forty and fifty de- 
grees below. Of the high school graduates, seventy- 
five per cent go on to college or university courses in the 
States. 

The site upon which Fairbanks is built is quite level 
and there are no mountains to stop its expansion and so 
street after street stretches from the business section to 
outlying suburbs upon which are beautiful homes. They 
are simple and unpretentious in architecture, consisting 
mostly of bungalows, sometimes of log cabins. But they 
are artistic in design, and, as a rule, surrounded with a 
wealth of flowers. Almost all have thrifty gardens and 
many have hothouses. 

In the outskirts of the town is a large park where 
the citizens enjoy many forms of recreation and where 
on the Fourth of July and other holidays automobile 
races are run and other sports indulged in. One of the 
usual Fourth of July events is a baseball game begun 
here at midnight. 

The town has many fraternal organizations, a tennis 
club, a rifle club, for there is good hunting in the vicinity, 
and other athletic organizations. It has also a woman's 
club that is a member of the Federation of Women's 
Clubs. This club maintains a children's playground at 
the park with a trained person in charge and the children 
are taught games, and their play is otherwise properly 
supervised. 

This club has done much good work for the town, one 
of its efforts being the establishment of the curfew law 



148 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

by which the children must be in their homes by nine 
o'clock in the winter and ten in the summer. One would 
think the youngsters themselves would be ready for bed 
by ten o'clock. But it must be remembered that in the 
summer it is bright daylight at this hour and the children 
had been in the habit, until the curfew took them in hand, 
of going off in the woods and picking berries until mid- 
night. 

The gardens and hothouses in Fairbanks are well worth 
a study by those who think that Alaska is an uninhabit- 
able and unproductive region. A home without a thrifty 
garden in which are growing potatoes, peas, cabbage, car- 
rots, beans, lettuce, celery, radishes, — in fact nearly all 
the vegetables that grow in the States, — is hard to find. 
And, in addition, home after home has at the side or in 
the rear, a hothouse. 

In one of these greenhouses, which stood at the rear 
of a charming bungalow, were growing tomatoes in great 
quantities, cucumbers, cantaloupes, peppers, onions, rad- 
ishes, lettuce, parsley and other kitchen herbs. Outside, 
in the garden, were cabbage and celery that had been 
started in the greenhouse. All the plants in the hothouse 
were in a flourishing condition and were bearing prolif- 
ically. Some of the tomatoes weighed thirty- four ounces 
and those weighing a pound were everywhere. The 
building, twelve by twelve feet, cost one hundred and 
fifty dollars. 

The near-by garden was a most appetizing sight. Peas, 
onions, beets, beans, carrots, potatoes, turnips, corn, rad- 
ishes, cauliflower, ground cherries were all flourishing. 
In one patch were sugar beets from which the family 
made its own syrup ; in another, lettuce heading up which 
the thrifty housewife hung up to dry and then by putting 
in water in the winter had fresh, crisp lettuce. 



Fairbanks, the Golden Heart of Alaska 149 

In the rear of the garden were a chicken yard and house 
where a large number of fowls scratched and clucked 
contentedly. In the winter chicken houses must be 
lighted and warmed, but this is not so difficult a matter 
as it sounds. The lighting is merely a matter of switch- 
ing on and off electricity for a few hours of the day. 
The heating is done by means of a big stove that only 
needs attention once a day. But this slight effort means 
fresh eggs, chickens for the table, and a good profit if one 
cares to make a business of the work. From these 
chickens, though they are kept merely for family use, 
seventy-five dollars was realized one January, and the 
cost of their feed was only thirty-seven dollars. 

It can thus be seen that life at Fairbanks, though in 
touch with the frontier and the primeval, has all the com- 
forts and pleasures that civilization has to offer. It is 
civilization in the heart of the wilderness, and the towns- 
folk drink of the joys of both. 

But Fairbanks has a bright future as well as an at- 
tractive present. Its prosperity does not depend entirely 
upon its mining industries. These are great. It is already 
acknowledged to be one of the world's greatest gold pro- 
ducing districts though its miners have worked under 
great handicaps. It has many comparatively low grade 
ores not worked yet because of the cost and it has quartz 
prospects that will yield richly when lowered cost of 
transportation permits the bringing in of the necessary 
machinery. In addition, tungsten and other valuable 
minerals have been found and are only waiting cheaper 
transportation rates to be mined. Four and a quarter 
millions have been taken out within one hundred and 
fifty miles of Fairbanks in one year. Half of the gold 
production of the Territory at present comes from around 
Fairbanks. 



150 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

This mineral wealth alone makes a bright future for 
the town. But the city .has much besides this in the 
territory adjacent to it to bring prosperity. It is in the 
heart of Alaska's richest agricultural domain. The 
Tanana Valley, which practically surrounds Fairbanks, 
contains a million acres of good agricultural land. Al- 
ready there are many small farms and dairies about 
Fairbanks that are doing exceedingly well. One of these 
about three-quarters of a mile from the town has ninety 
acres under cultivation and five hothouses in which are 
raised in the early spring tomatoes, cucumbers, canta- 
loupes, lettuce, onions and such green stuff. These are 
shipped to Iditerod, Ruby, Nenana, Fort Gibbon and 
other points in the interior, sometimes going as far as 
seven hundred miles. In the beginning of the season the 
tomatoes bring one dollar a pound and the cucumbers 
twenty-five cents to one dollar each. On the farm are 
grown barley, oats, hay, and in the neat patches are rows 
of cabbages, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, beets, onions, 
carrots, parsnips, beans, rhubarb, asparagus and other 
vegetables. Celery is placed on the market earlier here 
than in Boston. In a root cellar of one hundred and 
fifty ton capacity are stored the winter vegetables. It is 
built partly under and partly above ground, with walls of 
moss three feet thick. Hogs, chickens, geese, ducks are 
a part of the business. A threshing machine, mowing 
machine, reaper and binder do the work of the farm in 
the most modern way. 

This is but one of several such farms in the vicinity 
of Fairbanks, and those who do not have farms often 
cultivate a few acres for the profit to be hi:id from them. 
At one of the roadhouses near Fairbanks, the proprietor 
raises potatoes and has received nine cents a pound for 
them. He also, one season, cut eleven tons of hay which 



Fairbanks, the Golden Heart of Alaska 151 



toward spring brought him one hundred and twenty-five 
dollars a ton. He has received fifty and sixty dollars a 
dozen for chickens and fifty cents each for little newly 
hatched chicks. 

But the vital factor in Fairbanks' development is the 
coming of the government railroad. The interior ter- 
minus of the road is Fairbanks. This means much lower 
cost than heretofore on all things that Fairbanks and its 
industries need, on food, clothing, machinery, supplies 
of all kinds. It means, as well, cheap fuel, and this is 
an important factor. Not only in close proximity to 
Fairbanks but all along the railroad are rich deposits of 
coal. With the coming of the railroad these can be 
mined at a good profit and their product hauled at a 
comparatively low cost. When it is considered that the 
ground has to be thawed for all mining purposes, that the 
fuel for this now is wood, that the wood has to be hauled 
greater and greater distances each year as forests are 
denuded, that labor is high and transportation difficult, 
the significance of cheap fuel in connection with the 
development of the country is tremendous. That is the 
reason Fairbanks is looking for a growth that will be 
almost phenomenal when cheap transportation and fuel 
are hers. She has great resources waiting to be devel- 
oped. She needs these tools to bring them into being. 
When they join hands interior Alaska will become one 
of the busiest and greatest producing regions of tlie 
world. 

In addition, Fairbanks will become a great mecca for 
tourists. Many beautiful scenic highways centre here. 
The tourist can come by the entrancing Inside Passage, 
the magnificent White Pass and the fascinating Yukon, 
or the trip may be made up the Yukon and out over the 
White Pass. The government railroad running through 



152 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

some of the most wonderful scenery in the world will 
transport tourists in a few days from its beautiful sea- 
board terminus Seward or Anchorage, or they can come 
from Cordova or Valdez over one of the most glorious 
scenic auto highways in the world, a road which when it 
becomes better known will rank with the world's most 
famous roads for grandeur and beauty. For more than 
three hundred miles it runs through the heart of the most 
majestic mountain scenery the world knows, through 
peaceful valleys, over stupendous mountain ranges, 
through dark canyons, along torrential rivers. It is 
aflame with the beauty of wild flowers. It thrills with 
wild animal life. And not the least part of the enjoy- 
ment is the hospitality of the roadhouses, unique hostels 
unlike anything of their kind the world elsewhere has 
to offer, yet full of comfort, good cheer and good food 
in the heart of the primeval wilderness. 

Geographically, Fairbanks is the centre of Alaska. 
This, in itself, would be of little value, but when are con- 
sidered the rich mines, the agricultural possibilities about 
it, the railroad, roads and river that run like great arteries 
from here to carry these products to all parts of the 
Territory, this central location is valuable. It means 
that this geographical centre will make it industrially the 
centre of the Territory. 

An interesting side trip from Fairbanks is out to the 
creeks. " Creek " in Alaska has a special significance. 
It usually means a mining camp. One goes out to the 
creeks, or he is living on the creeks, and the understand- 
ing is that he is going to some mining camp or that he is 
mining. Creeks and mines are synonymous. So, when 
you go out to the creeks, you are not going to a picnic 
on some shady, winding stream as you might be doing 
did you thus state your intention in New Jersey or 



Fairbanks, the Golden Heart of Alaska 153 

Indiana, but you are going to a little mining camp or to 
some individual mining operation. 

When you first start out from Fairbanks for the creeks, 
however, you might think you were in New Jersey or 
Indiana, for you pass neat, thrifty-looking farms with 
rail fences and herds of sleek-looking cattle. But the 
scenery is different, for soon before you stretches the 
great, broad valley of the Tanana with the river gleam- 
ing in it, and far away blue mountains. On clear days 
Mt. McKinley, soaring twenty thousand, three hundred 
feet in the air, can be seen. 

Nor are the names of the farmers such as one usually 
hears in the East. The Alaskan farmer has, to be sure, 
a proper and polite cognomen. But the community is 
apt to give him one that it deems especially appropriate, 
and this is the one that rises most frequently to the lips. 
Thus one goes by the farm of Dirty-face John, and as 
men are passed along the road they are pointed out as 
Hungry Ike, Eat-'em-up Jack and other picturesque 
terms. 

The road sweeps up and down slight grades and soon 
the farming land is left behind and gentle hills appear. 
Here and there is a cabin, a dump, sluice boxes and the 
other paraphernalia of mining and you know you are 
reaching the mining district. The soil in many places is 
a black muck through which tiny streams sluggishly 
meander and is vastly different from one's preconceived 
ideas of gold-bearing ground. But underneath lies some 
of the best gold-bearing dirt in Alaska. To have your 
conductor with a wave of the hand point to a most 
ordinary scrubby looking hillside and say nonchalantly, 
"A million was taken out of there," or off to another 
stretch of grass and " nigger heads " and observe, " Jim 
got five hundred thousand out of that," gives you a sud- 



154 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



den and violent attack of gold fever. Or perhaps he will 
say. " The fellow who had that claim sold out for seven 
hundred and fifty dollars and the man who bought it 
cleaned up a million," and you wonder just what your 
feelings would have been had you been the fellow who 
sold. 

Fox. one of the small mining towns in this section, is 
but a collection of rather ramshackle houses, restaurants 
and stores on each side the railroad track, for a railroad 
runs out here from Fairbanks. Tailings are heaped all 
about, and the high framework that holds the flumes 
through which water is carried to the miners is right at 
the edge of the little settlement. 

A new method of mining has been introduced on some 
of the creeks that promises to be of great help in working 
low grade ores. It is an underground scraper that does 
with three men the work of twenty. This means a big 
saving and will permit the mining of ores hitherto not 
profitable. 

In the early days trips to the creeks were not so easy 
or pleasant as to-day. There were no roads and autos. 
The one going made his own trail through dense brush 
and often reached his destination with his clothes almost 
torn from his back. To-day, however, roads and a rail- 
road make a trip to the mining districts about Fairbanks 
a comfortable and pleasant expedition and one full of 
interesting information as to methods of placer mining. 



CHAPTER XII 

MOTORING THREE HUNDRED MILES IN THE HEART OF 

ALASKA 

The government road to the coast. A highway of unsur- 
passed SCENIC BEAUTY. THE WILDERNESS HOSTELRY AND ITS 
UNIQUE CHARM. THE VALLEYS, CANYONS AND GREAT SNOW 
PEAKS OF THE ROUTE. WiLD FLOWERS IN PROFUSION. ThE 

Copper River Railroad and its glaqers. 

From Fairbanks one of the most delightful routes to 
the coast is by automobile either to Valdez or to Chitina 
and thence by the Copper River Railroad to Cordova. 

The road is the government trail laid out in 1905 by 
the Alaska Road Commission of which General Wilds 
P. Richardson was then President. It is the mail route 
to the coast and in the winter, when navigation on the 
Yukon is closed, is the only means of communication 
between the interior and the outside. The mail is 
brought from Cordova or Valdez by sled to Fair- 
banks and then sent by dog team to Fort Gibbon, Nome, 
Caro, Arctic City north of the Arctic Circle, and to 
other interior points. At places where short cuts can be 
made in the winter, but which are impassable in summer, 
the winter trail branches off. Otherwise both winter 
and summer routes are the same. 

When the road was constructed there was no thought 
of its present use as a motor highway. But in 1913, 
Mr. Robert Sheldon, a resident of Fairbanks and Road 
Commissioner for the Fourth Judicial Division of the 
Territory, decided to see if the trip could not be made 

165 



156 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

by automobile. Speaking of his initial efforts he says, 
" When I first proposed an auto line to the coast my 
friends thought I ought to be examined for lunacy. 
The man who first said the trip could be done in a buck- 
board was counted insane and when I suggested doing it 
in an automobile, I was said to be in a worse state than 
he. But I made the very first trip in three days without 
any serious difficulty and would have accomplished it in 
less time had I not had a breakdown and been compelled 
to stop for repairs. Now, our stage line makes regular 
weekly trips, and often an extra run when some one is 
in a rush to get to the coast." 

On the morning the cars start, the stage office is a 
busy place. Passers-by stop to watch. People come to 
see friends off. Miners, tourists, workers at missions 
along the route, passengers of many kinds arrive with 
all sorts of baggage, from the tarpaulin " pack "of the 
prospector to the smart steamer trunk of the tourist. 
One after another the cars drive up. Baggage is roped 
on. The passengers are assigned seats and away the 
cars whirl. 

The route swings out one of the principal streets of 
Fairbanks and through a level stretch of land, past fields 
and gardens with wild flags blooming by the roadside 
until the spruce woods begin. Into their green depths 
it sweeps, a little stream mirroring their shadowy loveli- 
ness in its clear waters. A roadhouse is passed now and 
then, a staunch log building, sometimes with brilliant 
wild flowers growing on the roof. In a clearing a little 
farm is a picture of thrift and prosperity with its fields 
of oats and hay and its comfortable log dwelling. Then 
the Tanana River appears, swift, muddy, and in a few 
exhilarating hours of seemingly flying through spruce 
woods and lanes of wild flowers with a wonderful blue 



Motoring in the Heart of Alaska 157 



sky overhead and a cool, spicy air tingling the blood, the 
car sweeps up to Salchaket, the roadhouse, for luncheon. 

Each roadhouse is a study. Each is unique, each dif- 
ferent, and each reflects the personality of the one con- 
ducting it, so that they become an interesting study of 
temperament rather than a mere eating and resting place, 
for temperament is very much a part of life in Alaska. 
The man or woman who goes to Alaska and stays there 
is usually a person of marked individuality and it crops 
out in all he says and does. 

The Salchaket roadhouse has a comfortable sitting 
room with a broad, cushioned seat running along one 
side, with windows, a big stove with the inevitable rack 
above it for hats, socks, shirts, any and all kinds of wear- 
ing apparel that may need drying in winter or stormy 
weather. Rocking chairs, a couch, and the ever present 
phonograph further make the room homelike. To one 
side is a store and to the rear a dining-room where the 
table literally groans under the feast spread — roast beef, 
mashed potatoes, peas, salad, pickles and relishes of 
many kinds, stewed apricots, wild blueberries, cherries, 
pies, homemade bread and biscuit, and tea and coffee. 
Upstairs are comfortably furnished bedrooms and a bath- 
room with hot and cold water. 

Salchaket is a mission station of the Protestant Epis- 
copal church, and a little Indian settlement near by with 
its mission house and school gives an interesting glimpse 
of the good work done in Alaska by Bishop Rowe and 
his associates. 

The scenery that began with such gentle beauty soon 
grows wilder. The Tanana River is crossed on a flat, 
scowlike boat drawn by a cable and the road begins to 
climb, giving wonderful views of the broad river bottom 
with its mud flats and islands and mountains beyond. 



158 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

As lovely as the distant view is the one right by the car 
wheels of golden mustard and rosy fireweed and the ex- 
quisite pure azure of bluebells. Thickly among them 
grows a fine, feathery grass somewhat suggestive of the 
slim needles of the pine, but slenderer, more delicate, and 
a vivid green. It is a wonderful ribbon of color that 
winds by the road and the eye scarcely knows which to 
seek, the great spaces ahead of river and mountain, or 
the glowing gold and rose and blue and green at hand. 

The road winds at times through thick birch forests. 
Straight and slender and shining stands this debutante 
among trees, as some one has named this slim, white- 
robed dweller in the woods with its fluttering green 
leaves. Occasionally a little lake appears shining 
brightly in its frame of green. 

It is interesting to study the construction both of the 
road and the telegraph lines in this part of the world. 
All the bridged culverts that cross the road, and they are 
many, have slender poles sticking up at their ends. These 
poles tell the drivers in winter when the road is piled 
high with snow where to go. Else they might drop oflf 
the end of the bridge into a deep ditch. 

The telegraph wires are supported on three poles that 
in their arrangement suggest the outline of a tepee. 
This is done so that in case of forest fire the wires may 
have a better chance not to be grounded than would be 
the case if supported by one pole. 

The stop for the night is made at the Richardson road- 
house, immaculately clean, very comfortable, and with 
a supper prepared by one woman at three hours' notice 
for twenty-one hungry people, of moose steak, mashed 
potatoes, mashed turnips, macaroni and cheese, a good 
salad, hot biscuit, bread, radishes, tea and coffee, fresh 
rhubarb pie, a delicious pudding, stewed fruit of various 



Occasionally a little lake appears '" 



Motoring in the Heart of Alaska 159 

kinds, pickles, and two kinds of homemade cake. The 
cooking at all these roadhouses is excellent, the good home 
kind that is welcome to almost every one. Nearly all 
the places have their own gardens and raise lettuce, rad- 
ishes and all sorts of vegetables. Many have their own 
chickens and serve fresh eggs. At one were cows, and 
fresh milk, thick cream and homemade butter were on 
the menu. 

The stops at these roadhouses both at noon and night 
are enlivened not only with the phonograph, and there are 
good instruments and good records, but with stories told 
by those who gather in the living-room or about the dining 
table. Every roadhouse has its phonograph and a large 
supply of records, among those at one place being selec- 
tions by McCormack, Alma Gluck, by many noted grand 
opera singers, famous solos by noted violinists, composi- 
tions by Mendelssohn and composers of equal note. 

The stories told are drawn largely from personal expe- 
riences and give the hearers some unusual pictures of life 
in the wilds. Humor is not lacking, and often is as sharp 
and refreshing as the keen edge of the breeze that sweeps 
from snow peaks and spruce forests. Alaska politics and 
federal rulings are discussed with a frankness and clear- 
ness that throw a revealing light on many Alaskan prob- 
lems. So that the hours spent in living-room or at the 
table are a delightful and unique part of the trip. 

From Richardson the road runs high above the river 
and then sweeps into the Tenderfoot Creek district, an 
old mining region v^here deserted cabins and abandoned 
dumps tell of the work of bygone days. Here and there 
some prospects are still being worked. The soil is a 
black muck and the miners had to go down seventy-five 
feet to gravel in some instances, which made mining here 
costly since it was difficult to get in machinery and sup- 



160 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

plies. Across the hills is Cyclone City where now is just 
one inhabitant. 

The road soon leaves this little story of failure and 
disappointment behind and sweeps out upon a wonderful 
view, the river miles broad cut up into innumerable chan- 
nels and with countless islands and far off upon the 
horizon a great world of mountains unfolding and infold- 
ing into more and more ranges. Farther on the stream 
narrows in again. Big, bold bluffs appear, and another 
ferry with cable carries the car across to a roadhouse, a 
few other buildings and a little level space covered with 
grass. The Tanana River sweeps off among the moun- 
tains and is lost to view, but the Delta River almost imme- 
diately appears and is seen every little while adding its 
beauty to the ever-changing landscape. 

The road soon skirts a deep shadowy ravine, the car 
on a level with the tops of the trees, and cliffs shutting 
the gaze in to the beauty at hand of sombre depths, gray 
boulders and steep rock wall. Then suddenly it sweeps 
out again into the great spaces and you ride along the rim 
of a chasm that is suggestive a bit of the Grand Canyon 
of the Colorado except that instead of mountains and 
peaks below the eye is a vast forest of innumerable thou- 
sands of spruce trees. Straight and tall they stand in 
orderly rows as far as the eye can see. Far on the other 
side is the level rim of the chasm, beyond this blue moun- 
tains, and far on the distant horizon the great Alaskan 
Range with peak upon peak towering into a sky cloud- 
lessly, vividly blue. Monarch of all, Mt. Hayes rises 
superbly white almost fourteen thousand feet. 

Soon, on the other side of the road, appear the Sheep 
Mountains, snow-capped and snow-crevassed, and thus 
named because they are the home of great numbers of 
mountain sheep. The silver tip and glacier bear are also 



Motoring in the Heart of Alaska 161 

found there and these mountains are a popular country 
with the big game hunters. 

All along the roadside, and as beautiful in their way 
as the great snowy peaks, are the wild flowers, yellow 
daisies, wild larkspur, a wonderful blue, and the harebell, 
a mountain variety with a lovely blue cup much like a 
crocus, growing on a short stem that droops under the 
weight of the blossoms and gives the flower the effect of 
being strewn carelessly but gracefully over the ground. 
The color is an exquisite pure purple-blue, the flower 
rather large and as it lies on the ground as if scattered 
by a lavish hand, the effect is beautiful. 

A stop is made for luncheon and then the journey is 
resumed through a green valley, treeless, but with a sheet 
of emerald green grass sweeping up the gentle slopes of 
th hills that hem the little valley in. These hills are 
known as the Fox Hills because of the great number of 
these animals that burrow here. Now and then a break 
in the green walls gives a vision of tiny, silvery lakes, 
the broad river and peak after peak, unbelievably high, 
of the great range that banks the horizon. 

Onward the road winds through spruce forests, 
through lanes of wild flowers, azure blue larkspur, yellow 
daisies, white blossoms of many kinds, rich purple-blue 
lupines, lavender asters, an exquisite rose-pink pea; the 
bluebells and the pink peas side by side as if knowing 
that they enhanced each other's loveliness by their blue 
and pink contrast. Out close to the broad shallow river 
the road winds, the mud flats of the river ablaze with 
great sheets of the rosy wild pea; the shining silvery 
water, the vivid pink, the blue sky and the snow moun- 
tains making a spectacle of color dazzling in its brilliance. 

A stop is made for the night at a comfortable log 
roadhouse on the banks of a rushing river with moun- 



162 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

tains all around and the next morning the road winds 
high above the river with the mountains green in the 
foreground and snowy, far-away peaks hemming in the 
scene. Then the vista narrows. The end of the road 
seems to be blocked with a great range of snow moun- 
tains, more magnificent than any Alps, and then out over 
the bed moraine of a glacier it sweeps with a rushing 
glacial stream here and there and a great, blue ice cave 
showing at the foot of the glacier not far away. Over 
the gray rocks sweeps the carpet of glowing wild peas. 
Far and near soar snow mountains and overhead arches 
a wondrously blue sky. It is a spectacle of color and 
grandeur to ravish the senses and it is doubtful if the 
world can equal it elsewhere. In fact, men who have 
been over the road and who have travelled in nearly all 
parts of the world say it is not matched elsewhere for 
superb scenery. It is a road not so well known to tour- 
ists, but travelled principally by the people of Alaska 
who know it and by government officials and those com- 
ing to Alaska both from foreign countries and our own 
upon special missions. This road offers a short cut to 
the coast and they take it rather than the long trip to the 
mouth of the Yukon and thence a long sea voyage. They 
have little idea of the scenery that awaits them, but when 
they do discover what a treat is theirs they are loud in 
their enthusiastic praise. 

Along the bank of the river, around high bluffs, the 
road winds, flowers draping the sheer walls like hanging 
gardens, then into a narrow, V-shaped valley, the walls 
rising at steep angles. It is a valley peculiar in its grim 
beauty and evidently volcanic. The walls are sheer, 
smooth slides of what seems a fine gravel, a soft, gray 
green in hue, colored here and there with red. At the 
top they are cut and ridged into jagged peaks. Not a 



Motoring in the Heart of Alaska 163 

shrub, not a spear of grass grows on them. But this 
severity is not unbeautiful. The sweep is so tremendous, 
the sides so smooth, the color so odd yet so soft that 
the eye lingers upon the strange, weird loveliness. 

Then out into a green meadow the road flashes, and 
gentler green hills appear and lakes, and a glance back- 
ward shows the snow mountains as a great circle of peaks 
just showing above the nearer hills. Far back to the 
left a glacier is seen and a turbulent stream pours from 
it and wanders through a green valley and into a lake 
beyond. In the distance is seen one of the government's 
winter relief stations, a cabin stocked with wood and 
various necessities for those who may get caught in a 
blizzard. For this is about the top of the divide between 
the waters that flow into the Yukon and those that join 
Copper River. It is eighteen miles here between road- 
houses and in the winter those trudging on foot or in 
sleighs often get caught in terrific Arctic storms and 
would perish if no shelter were near. The cabin is en- 
tered from the roof for the snow is piled to the eaves and 
it would be impossible to enter by an ordinary door. 

The road now runs for many miles along another swift 
flowing river, the Delta having been left behind, that 
winds in graceful curves around high bluffs and jutting 
peaks and wooded islands. The current is rapid and foams 
and swirls over bars and rocks, or in deeper places flows 
with the quiet swiftness of strength and volume. Then 
it swings away behind hills and a region of lovely lakes 
begins, tiny pools some of them, lying amid spruce trees 
and wild grasses and blossoms with clearcut reflections of 
sky and tree and flower in them and tiny wild ducks joy- 
ously swimming on their smooth surface. 

A roadhouse is reached for the night, a comfortable 
place with deer skins and other fur rugs on the floors, 



164 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



with rocking chairs, and ice water and deHcious fried 
chicken and oranges and French fried potatoes and 
many other dehghtful things one would never suppose 
could be served in the wilderness. 

The scene that lies before the eye in the morning as 
the start is made brings a gasp of amazement. Rising 
sheer into the blue sky seemingly but a hand's throw away 
are three towering mountains clothed with a shining gar- 
ment of snow from top to base, Mt. Wrangell, sixteen 
thousand feet high, Mt. Sanford, fourteen thousand feet 
high, and another colloquially called " The Drum " al- 
most the same height. Serene, majestic, they stand, and 
all day, from one point or another as the road winds 
toward them, they rise before the eye. Clouds drift and 
float across them. Exquisite blue-gray shadows soften 
at times their sides. But from early morning till the 
Alpine glow flushes them a lovely rose pink, they dom- 
inate the landscape. And it may be that Mt. Wrangell 
will be in a specially gracious mood and " blow " or 
" steam " or " smoke," as the operation is variously called, 
when an airy, delicate cloud of steam drifts slowly up- 
ward from its crater and poised, lightly as thistledown, 
finally floats off into the blue. 

The scenery of this day's ride is the most magnificent 
of the trip. The mountains of the great Coast Range fill 
the sky with peaks fourteen thousand, fifteen thousand 
and sixteen thousand feet high. At times the road sweeps 
out where some broad valley will carry the vision hun- 
dreds of miles down its length, dotted with lakes, green 
with forests, showing a river like a silver ribbon tracing 
its way through it. Again the road clings close to the 
mountain side far above the Copper River which winds 
through a great chasm with high, sandy cut banks and 
huge bluffs and level flats covered with spruce. High 



Motoring in the Heart of Alaska 165 

above all soars Mt. Wrangell, the steam slowly, mistily 
drifting from its top. 

Past Copper Centre, a little town of log houses, log 
stores, warehouses, dog houses and stables, the autos 
whirl, over a rushing mountain river, up a hill giving 
superb views backward of river and mountains, then 
through a dense woods of tall, straight spruce and birch 
trees, the vista ahead that of a shadowy green lane with 
a glowing border each side of rosy fireweed and at the 
far end snow mountains with their soft blue shadows. 
Then down through a deep, sombre gorge the road 
plunges and up again on high bluffs above the Copper 
River and then out into a green meadow where is a road- 
house and supper. 

In a lovely setting is this roadhouse. Low hills are on 
one side with spruce and birch. An ash-gray canyon 
leads off into the mountains in another direction and 
the great sweep of the Copper River basin and the majes- 
tic range of snow mountains delicately flushing pink in 
the sunset fills the remainder of the view. 

Chitina, the end of the journey, is not far away, and af- 
ter supper the start is made for it. Across a river the road 
winds and then up and up six miles around mountain walls 
and above the Copper River it climbs. The wide rushing 
river far below is a sheet of gold in the sunset light. The 
high cut banks are a delicate sand color. The tiny islands 
that dot the waters are the deep, shadowy green of 
crowded spruce. As far as the eye can see across the 
great chasm of the river is peak after peak of snow moun- 
tains all rosy now in the Alpine glow. And rising 
serenely from Mt. Wrangell is a huge, straight column 
foaming over at the top into the likeness of a great, 
glorious flower. 

One wonders if he is dreaming. The beauty, the tre- 



166 Alaska, Onr Beautiful Northland 

mendousness of it all seem unearthly. One feels there 
can be no such scenery on this planet. But on the auto 
whirls, around the head of a deep canyon down which 
rushes a waterfall and then out again to the river bank 
with its glorious view. It is half past eleven at night 
but the light is still strong, which adds to the sense of 
the unreality of it all. 

As Chitina is neared, the road plunges into a deep, 
sombre canyon. The walls rise high and sheer on both 
sides. A chain of little lakes black in the shadow of the 
cliffs fills the canyon floor. The road runs, a narrow 
thread, between rock and water. Far ahead the walls 
appear to close in together. There seems no space for 
the road at all. But it twists and turns along the water's 
edge and finally sweeps out into an open, rocky, level 
space and Chitina is reached. 

Chitina is the usual small Alaskan town of a few houses 
mostly of log, several hotels, stores and restaurants. 
This is the terminus of the auto road ami the Copper 
River Railroad is taken for the continuation of the jour- 
ney to Cordova. 

This railroad achieved the seemingly impossible in rail- 
road construction. At one point it runs between two of 
the most famous glaciers in the world, the Miles and the 
Childs, and the bridge that spans the river here has a his- 
tory unique in the annals of bridge building. 

Aside from the interest the feat of constructing such a 
road holds, the route has scenic beauty of a high order. 
From Chitina the road passes on high trestles over sev- 
eral deep gorges past an Indian village where fish are 
drying, on down along the river with fine views before 
and behind of the stream and the great snow mountains 
towering above it. Then the road plunges into n canyon 
with high bluffs jutting in points into the river. High 



Motoring in the Heart of Alaska 167 

above the swift water, the track creeps around the moun- 
tain edge, giving marvellous views at every turn. Farther 
on, Baird Glacier comes into view with grass and other 
vegetation growing on the glacial ice. 

The scene becomes a wonderland of ice, snow moun- 
tains, dense vegetation and the swiftly flowing river. 
Then into the famous Abercrombie Canyon the road 
plunges, the walls rising steep and sheer, the river foam- 
ing over great rocks and tossing and swirling in cataracts 
and rapids that make those of White Horse seem play- 
things in comparison. 

The road now comes to its famous glacial stretch, 
Miles Glacier across the river with a front three miles 
long and two hundred and fifty feet high, and Childs 
Glacier almost at the track side with a front also three 
miles wide but three hundred feet high. It is said that at 
one time this great ice sheet was connected but that the 
Copper River cut it in two. 

It is a magnificent sight. Far to the sky line on each 
side the sheet of ice sweeps. Jagged mountains are all 
around with snow in their ravines and crevasses, their 
lower slopes green with birch and willow, and right at 
hand the two towering ice walls, castellated, crevassed, 
fretted into spires and minarets and towers, and blue- 
white and sparkling in the sun. 

The moraines look like great heaps of tailings. Earth 
has lodged in them and though the soil is a compound of 
glacial ice, rock and muck, vegetation grows luxuriantly 
in it, and gradually over these unsightly moraines nature 
spreads a lovely mantle of green. 

On down through ever changing mountain and river 
views the train whirls till at last Cordova, the copper 
gateway of Alaska, is reached. It is a busy town of 
pretty homes, bustling stores and hotels. 



CHAPTER XIII 

to the westward 
Valdez and the Keystone Canyon. Port Wells and its 

FIORDS AND MARVELLOUS GLACIERS. BEAUTIFUL KODIAK. ThE 

Aleutian Islands. Katmai Volcano and the great erup- 
tion OF 1912. BoGOSLOF Islands. Dutch Harbor and 

Unalaska. 

From Cordova " to the westward," as the phrase runs, 
stretches a great region of islands, peninsulas and intri- 
cate waterways as interesting, beautiful and rich in re- 
source as any other section of Alaska. But it is less well 
known. It is off the beaten track. It has, with the ex- 
ception of a few towns, very little transportation service, 
and so it lies here unvisited, unknown, yet with a life of 
to-day and a history of yesterday that thrills. 

It was to this part of Alaska that the Russians first 
came and not only are the descendants of these early 
Russians to be found on these islands to the westward but 
here and there is a quaint little Russian church, the ruins 
of an old shipyard or of some other of their industries. 
On these islands more than a hundred years ago gardens 
were planted and cattle raised. 

The Indians who live here to-day are still in their most 
primitive condition and one can still see many of their 
quaint practices and customs. 

On these islands are rich undeveloped, even unguessed, 
resources. New discoveries are constantly being made. 
Only recently chrome ore was discovered. At one place 
is a peculiarly beautiful stone that washes up on the beach 

168 



To the Westward 169 

in almost unlimited quantities. It seems to be from 
descriptions a combination of agate and opal, for those 
who find it cannot classify it. But they say it has the 
markings of an agate and also a pure, clear, lovely light in 
it like an opal. When cut and polished it makes beautiful 
trinkets. So great is the amount washed in that the 
natives have paved a stretch of sidewalk in their little 
settlement with it. 

In this region are the great volcanoes of Alaska. Some 
peaks are almost constantly steaming. At times there 
are terrific eruptions. Islands appear and disappear with 
spectacular displays of energy that both fascinate and 
appall. 

And with all this picturesqueness of history, primitive- 
ness of peoples, richness of resource and titanic exhibi- 
tions of nature is a grandeur of scenery that thrills. 

One can come to this region direct from Seattle or con- 
tinue the trip from Cordova, if the journey so far has been 
by the route through the interior. 

The harbor at Cordova is one of gentle beauty. Islands 
dot it, and headlands crowded with spruce make the shore- 
line a stretch of lovely curves. The hills rise steeply from 
the water's edge dense with the forest except where the 
trees have been cut away to make room for the houses 
clinging to the steep side. The town of Cordova itself 
lies the better part of a mile back from the harbor. 

From Cordova to Valdez is a comparatively short 
trip through much of the same kind of beautiful scenery 
as the Inside Passage. Tremendous rocks, frowning 
crags, dense forests, towering peaks purely white, make 
the journey one of scenic enchantment. 

The harbor of Valdez, with the little town nestling at 
the feet of the lofty mountains, forms another beautiful 
picture as the steamer sails up to the dock. The town 



170 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

though small is a place of pretty homes, comfortable ho- 
tels and attractive shops and makes excellent headquarters 
for a stay of a week or more. Many delightful trips can 
be taken from Valdez, and the person who wants a brief 
holiday in Alaska at minimum expense will find this a 
most satisfactory spot to select. 

One of the popular trips from Valdez is a motor ride 
through Keystone Canyon. This road joins the trail from 
Fairbanks to Chitina and one can go on to Chitina down 
through the wonderful scenery of the Copper River Rail- 
road and back to Valdez by launch or steamer from Cor- 
dova, thus making a round trip that for scenery has few 
equals. 

The road leads back from Valdez up through the tow- 
ering mountains that enclose the town. At times the road 
winds up and up twenty-six hundred feet, almost a steady 
climb of seven miles, giving superb views of mountain 
ranges, great valleys and winding streams. Waterfalls 
rush down the mountain sides, glaciers thrust out their 
icy tongues to dispute the way, overhanging cliffs almost 
brush the top of the car. It is a ride of wild, rugged 
grandeur that thrills with tonic exhilaration and yet is 
not without loveliness of wild flowers and the sombre 
beauty of spruce to soften the grim gray rocks. 

Another trip rich in scenic grandeur is to the Port 
Wells country. This is off the beaten track, but few 
regions of Alaska offer more remarkable natural beauty. 
It is at present a mining section and small launches run 
from Valdez carrying supplies for the miners. They can 
also be hired exclusively for the trip. 

The little boat skims through beautiful narrow water- 
ways with islands and wooded points giving graceful 
shore lines and towering snow mountains carrying the 
eye to the blue vault above. Past Glacier Island into Co- 



To the Westward 171 

lumbia Bay the launch speeds with a view of Columbia 
Glacier said by many to be the most beautiful glacier in 
Alaska. Thence the- route lies past Granite Point, with 
Fairmount Island on the left, and Kniklik, a deserted 
Indian village, a little silent collection of huts and log 
houses with a tiny Russian church. It brings pictures of 
a strange, quaint foreign life here a century or more ago, 
a life that was an unusual mingling of the Old World and 
the most primitive of the New. 

But the village and its memories are soon left behind 
and the boat flits into picturesque Esther Passage with 
high enclosing mountains and then out into the broad, 
shining waters of Port Wells. 

Port Wells is from fifteen to twenty miles long and 
ten miles wide. The mountain walls rise steeply. Bays 
and inlets lure on each side but a richer feast waits, and 
on the boat speeds to Harriman and College Fiords at 
the northern end where the magnificent scenery lies. 

On all sides are towering mountains capped and cloaked 
with ice and snow, with glaciers sweeping down their 
sides through gorge and ravine. Rushing waterfalls are 
everywhere and the sound of their waters and the cracking 
of the bergs as they break from the glacial ice walls fill 
the air. The water is dotted with these stately bergs 
slowly moving to sea, some as high as four and five story 
buildings, fantastic in shape, wondrously blue and glitter- 
ing in the sun like millions of diamonds. When a glacier 
breaks and a berg takes its plunge the water boils like a 
Niagara and great waves rush shoreward setting the 
other bergs to dancing and shining with even greater 
radiance as they dip and sparkle in the sunlight and water. 

Wild life is abundant. Waterfowls of all kinds are 
everywhere. Ducks contentedly float on the waves or fly 
in great flocks low over the water. At one point is a great 



172 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

rock where high above the waters the gulls in countless 
thousands make their home. The Indians come here for 
the eggs. Fish are plentiful. 

But, after all, it is the scenery that holds the gaze. 
College Fiord stretches before one twenty-four miles long 
and two to three miles broad, sombre in the shadow of 
its steep mountain walls yet impressive in its stern beauty. 
At the head lie Yale and Harvard Glaciers and on its 
western side eight others, all named after our colleges — 
Radcliffe, Baltimore, Smith, Bryn Mawr, Vassar, Welles- 
ley, Barnard, Holyoke. In cascading ice falls, in great 
ice cliffs, in gentler winding ice streams with great circles 
of snow mountains for background, with bare peaks, gray 
granite cliffs and tongues of spruce and hemlock here and 
there in near-by ravines about them, they come down and 
break in ice walls from one hundred to three hundred and 
fifty feet high at the water's edge. The surrounding 
mountains are eight thousand, nine thousand and ten 
thousand feet high, hoary, majestic peaks that fill in the 
background on all sides. 

Harriman Fiord is on the same order, only perhaps 
not quite so long, and with not quite so many glaciers. 
But its enclosing walls are three thousand to four thou- 
sand feet high, and it is a place of unspeakable grandeur 
and sublimity. 

The trip is easily taken from Valdez and one can bring 
a little camping outfit and camp anywhere along the 
shore at little cost. Firewood is plentiful, fish and game 
abound, and boats will bring supplies or pick one up when- 
ever desired. 

The return can be made to Valdez or the trip can be 
continued through winding waterways and past islands 
and capes, for Prince William Sound is crowded with 
islands to Seward, the coast terminus of the government 



To the Westward 173 

railroad and on around into Cook Inlet and up to Anchor- 
age where are located the headquarters of the Alaska 
Engineering Commission that has the building of the 
government railroad in charge. The trip is in every part 
interesting and beautiful, full of glorious scenery and 
touching closely upon the early Russian history of Alaska. 

South from the Kenai Peninsula, which is skirted in 
this trip, is the Kodiak group of islands, and westward 
from these the Alaska Peninsula and the Aleutian Is- 
lands, The Aleutian Islands alone extend some twelve 
hundred miles westward from the Alaskan Peninsula. 
From this it can be judged what an area this little known 
" westward " part of Alaska covers. 

The name Kodiak is generally accepted to mean the 
island and the little town that are so called but originally 
the name was applied to the archipelago which includes 
Kodiak Island, Afognak, and some others. The name as 
used by the Russians was Kadiak from the Indian word 
Kaniag, meaning island, though other authorities give 
the Indian name as Kikhtak. Kadiak is still used by 
some, though Kodiak is the one most frequently heard. 
Since, however, Kadiak was the earlier usage and seems 
to be nearer the Indian name, it would seem as if it were 
the better one to adopt. 

On some of the islands there is quite a bit of spruce 
timber. The shore line in many places consists of high 
bluffs with pinnacles or needle rocks on many points ex- 
tremely picturesque in effect. But Kodiak itself has 
little of this character. The eastern half of the island is 
wooded and there are some mountains. But the land- 
scape in the main is composed of gently rounded hills 
covered with grass. If the name Emerald Isle had not 
already been preempted it would aptly apply, for many 
world travellers say the hills here are the greenest they 



174 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

have ever seen. Some have called Kodiak a lyric, it is 
such a remote secluded bit of pastoral beauty with its 
quiet, primitive life, the billows of green sweeping to 
the hill tops and the wide grass-grown streets, the simple 
homes, the quaint Greek church of the town. John Bur- 
roughs says it is one of the fairest sights the world has 
to offer. It is a bit of the Old World that few know 
dropped down in this far-away corner of the New, and 
so little has modern life touched it that it is still a mix- 
ture of the primitive and mediaeval. 

Both the island and the town of Kodiak were settled 
by the Russians. Colonists were brought, forts and 
houses built and gardens planted. Many of the inhabi- 
tants to-day are descendants of these early Russians and 
the Russian language is heard quite as much as English. 
In fact, a school teacher in a near-by settlement on the 
Kenai Peninsula said that when she went there Russian 
was the only language spoken. In addition to the Rus- 
sians, Kodiak also has a native population and some 
American residents connected with the government agri- 
cultural station located here and with the fishing indus- 
tries. 

Many quaint Russian customs survive. Holy Week, 
the " Bright Week " in the Russian calendar, is a time of 
great festivities. Natives, no matter how far distant, 
hasten home for its celebration. There are many relig- 
ious ceremonies and processions brilliant with color and 
gay with music. The kiss of peace is exchanged in public 
with enemies and old feuds are forgotten. 

Music and dancing are a great part of life here. The 
people are very proud of their dance hall and it is one of 
the first places shown the stranger. Every one comes to 
the dances, from the descendants of early Russian gov- 
ernors to shy, quiet Aleut maidens and young men. On 



To the Westward 175 

one side of the hall the women and girls sit and on the 
other the men and boys. There is no conversation be- 
tween the men and women and no mingling as in our 
parlors or at our social affairs. The musicians suddenly 
begin playing at a furious rate, a youth crosses the floor, 
inclines his head slightly before the partner of his choice, 
all follow suit and the dance is on. 

The luxuriant grass of the island makes it an admirable 
place for cattle raising. So abundant is this grass that 
Kodiak has been likened to the " guinea grass " pastures 
of the tropics. The island is said to be the equal of the 
best grazing land in the States. The natives have an 
ingenious labor-saving method of harvesting it. When 
cut on the mountain side, for it grows to the tops of the 
low mountains, it is done up in bundles in fish nets and 
sent rolling down the mountain side to the bottom where 
it is picked up and taken home, often in boats. 

Flowers grow in profusion and salmon berries, high- 
bush blueberries, and other wild berries are found. 

Westward from Kodiak, across treacherous Shelikof 
Strait, lies the Alaska Peninsula, a region little developed 
and little known. It is rugged, destitute of trees, and 
the shore is indented with countless bays and coves mostly 
small and full of rocks. It is not a region to attract the 
settler or the miner, though for the latter there is always 
the possibility of a strike in the unknown parts of Alaska. 
But it is a region to attract the scientist, for on this 
Peninsula and the Aleutian Islands is one of the greatest 
and least known volcanic regions of the world. 

This volcanic zone really begins at the head of Cook 
Inlet and extends westward some sixteen hundred miles. 
It runs in two parallel ridges, in many places only twenty- 
five miles apart, and in this narrow though extended line 
is almost every volcano that has been active since this 



176 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

region was known to white men. There are now about 
sixty volcanoes in this stretch, about forty of which are 
on the Alaska Peninsula, though these figures cannot be 
stated as absolutely accurate since there is yet but little 
scientific exploration of this region. The National Geo- 
graphic Society has sent several expeditions here that have 
done excellent work. But the area to be covered is so 
large and the expense of a suitable expedition is so great 
that taking the region as a whole little exact scientific 
data is yet available. 

On the west coast of Cook's Inlet before the Alaska 
Peninsula is reached are two volcanoes, Mount Redoubt, 
or Redoute as it is variously spelled, and Mt. Iliamna, 
rising eleven thousand and twelve thousand feet respec- 
tively. Iliamna is a majestic cone soaring sheer and 
beautiful into the sky. Sometimes it steams, the volcanic 
sand and dust that pours out being so black that the 
mountain is locally said to smoke. At the foot of Cook's 
Inlet is the island of St. Augustine, almost entirely a 
single volcanic cone of striking grandeur. 

This volcanic ridge, a great fissure or vent it is supposed 
to be, extends on down the Alaska Peninsula where its 
most famous peak is Mt. Katmai. The eruption of this 
mountain in 1912 was the most tremendous volcanic ex- 
plosion ever recorded. 

Vesuvius has had its story teller. Because of this, and 
also because of the suffering and loss wrought, it stands 
out in the world's thought as the historic disaster of this 
kind. Mt. Pelee has been largely forgotten except by 
scientists. But the eruption of Mt. Katmai in 1912 over- 
shadows both of these so greatly in magnitude that they 
are insignificant beside it. 

The explosions and the shocks threw men and horses 
to the ground four hundred miles away. It was felt to 



To the Westward 177 

the shore of the Arctic Ocean. The ash fell nine hundred 
miles away, and according to scientists the fine dust went 
into the higher regions of the atmosphere over the whole 
world and affected the weather for the summer, being 
the cause of the cold, wet season of that year. 

The effect of the eruption is more comprehensible, how- 
ever, if comparisons are made with familiar things. Pro- 
fessor Robert F. Griggs, who was the leader of the ex- 
pedition sent by the National Geographic Society to Kat- 
mai after the disaster, computes that the ashes that fell 
buried an area as large as the State of Connecticut to a 
depth varying from ten inches to more than ten feet ; that 
if Mt. Katmai had been where Vesuvius is, it would have 
buried Naples fifteen feet, Rome a foot, that the sound 
would have been heard in Paris, the dust would have 
fallen in Brussels and the fumes have been noticeable in 
Norway. 

Had the eruption happened in New York City, the 
town would have been smothered under ashes from ten 
to fifteen feet deep, the steam would have been visible at 
Albany, Philadelphia would have been covered a foot and 
dark for sixty hours, Washington and Buffalo would also 
have received an ash cloak a quarter of an inch in depth 
and ashes would have fallen as far as the Gulf of Mexico. 
The sound of the explosion would have been heard in 
Atlanta, Georgia, and St. Louis and the fumes would have 
been noticeable in Denver, San Antonio and Jamaica. 

Fortunately, the disaster did not occur in a settled 
district. Kodiak was the chief sufferer and its green 
beauty became a gray desert. Though one hundred miles 
away, the island was buried under ash. The roofs of the 
houses were broken in by the ashes that settled on them. 
The land was a land of darkness and stifling fumes and 
all the water was poisoned. 



178 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

A vessel that happened to be in the harbor of Kodiak 
took the people on board and supplied their needs as best 
it could until a weird, gray dawn at last broke and they 
returned to their homes and began the task of rehabilita- 
tion. Many of the cattle on the island perished for there 
was neither food nor drink. The government experi- 
mental station shipped its herd to the States until vege- 
tation again appeared. 

But the greatest desolation was wrought on the Alas- 
ka Peninsula in the immediate vicinity of the moun- 
tain. The little village of Katmai though five times as 
far away as Pompeii from Vesuvius or St. Pierre from 
Mt. Pelee was a berren waste. The roofs were sunken 
in on the houses and the buildings were filled with pumice. 
The church stood in a sea of liquid mud. Trees were 
dead. Pumice was everywhere. To add to the destruc- 
tion, if this were possible, a lake that had been formed by 
rubbish that had gathered across a stream and dammed 
it, broke and a flood swept down bringing boulders and 
trees and leaving a great plain of sticky mud. 

For several years after the explosion columns of steam 
a mile high and a thousand feet in diameter poured from 
other volcanoes of the group. New volcanoes came into 
existence at the time. Katmai itself really blew its head 
off and is to-day but a stub of what it was before the ex- 
plosion. The force of the explosion right at the peak was 
so great that rocks were literally blown to pieces and the 
lava was so charged with gas it became steam. 

To-day it is doubtful if there is such unusual, spectacu- 
lar and magnificent scenery elsewhere in the world though 
it may not be wise to speak of anything in the neigh- 
borhood of Katmai as being of a permanent nature for 
m the twinkling of an eye it may all be changed. But 
as it stands at present, the region is a remarkable spec- 



To the Westward 179 

tacle of mud plains, ash slides a thousand feet high, 
colored canyons, steaming vents, smoking valleys, ravines 
filled with bright red mud, and crowning all, great snow 
peaks. 

The crater itself is worth going far to see. It is an 
enormous, infinitely deep cavity, part of its floor a won- 
drous blue-green lake, part of it fields of sulphur, part of 
it fields of snow. Thousands of jets of steam issue with 
a roar from cracks and crevices, rising sometimes several 
thousands of feet high. Despite the heat the snow in the 
crater is not melted. To gaze into this great depth, yellow 
and white and green and blue, circled with its columns of 
snowy, roaring steam, is to lose all sense of familiar 
mother earth and to seem to be on another planet. 

Equally unusual and spectacular is a great valley 
stretching as far as the eye can see, filled with thousands 
of little volcanoes. Through the unbroken ground, 
through deep holes, through fissures pour jets of steam, 
some small, some rising in columns a thousand feet high. 
The whole great valley is filled with these jets of steam 
soaring to heaven in snowy beauty. It has been called the 
Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes. 

More natural, but very beautiful, is a canyon several 
thousand feet deep with faintly green rock walls on one 
side, rich, mahogany-hued bluffs on the other, and tower- 
ing above and back of these sheer cliffs, snow peaks, 
glaciers, snow fields and waterfalls. It is the Grand Can- 
yon of the Colorado and the Canadian Rockies combined. 

If this region remains as it is and can be made more 
accessible for the tourist it has for him beauty of most 
unusual order and scientific interest of a rare kind. 

On beyond the Alaska Peninsula stretch the Aleu- 
tian Islands, also volcanic though in not so spectacular a 
fashion as at Katmai, 



180 Alaska, Our Eeantiful Northland 

Unimak Island, the most easterly of the Aleutians, has 
two volcanoes, Mt. Shishaldin and Mt. Pogrumnoi. Shi- 
shaldin is between eight and nine thousand feet high and 
in its graceful curving sides, pure cone-shaped peak soar- 
ing into the sky and slowly drifting veil of steam which 
is almost always to be seen floating from its top, rivals 
the famous Fujiyama for beauty, 

Unimak is the scene of the most frequent volcanic 
activity in Alaska. Whole ridges of mountain peaks 
split and open and emit flames, lava and ashes. The 
Russian missionary Veniaminof in describing an eruption 
on Unimak says, " There was a prolonged subterranean 
noise like terrific cannonading, then a low ridge to the 
northeast opened, and flames and black ashes poured out. 
The ice and snow on the mountain melted and descended 
in terrific torrents five to ten miles wide." 

Beyond Unimak are a few small islands and then comes 
Unalaska. Here are two volcanoes, but they are not 
active. Even from the first coming of the Russians they 
have shown no signs of life except that occasionally one 
has steamed a little. 

Off the northwest shore of Unalaska, however, has 
been unusual volcanic activity, for here the Bogoslof 
Islands, composed entirely of volcanic rock, rose out of 
the sea. A lone peak was here in Captain Cook's time, 
who called it Ship Island. In 1796 the natives on Una- 
laska saw what looked like a fog about this rock and one 
Indian more courageous than the others put out in his 
boat. He soon returned in terror and said that the sea 
all about the rock was boiling and that what had been 
thought to be fog was the steam from it. Later a consid- 
erable mass of rock upheaved and the major part of the 
present island was formed. The Russians gave it the 
name of loanna Bogoslova, St. John the Theologian, be- 



To the Westward 181 

cause the upheaval occurred on this saint's day in the Rus- 
sian calendar. The name has been retained except that 
it has been shortened to Bogoslova or Bogoslof Islands. 
In 1883 more land rose, some parts being three hundred 
feet high, accompanied by dark clouds of dust that drifted 
over Unalaska and fell in showers of volcanic ash. In 
1903, Fire Island came out of the water. In 1906, an- 
other island rose to a height of three hundred and ninety- 
five feet but before it had cooled it sank with a loud 
explosion. 

But one must not think the Aleutian Islands are con- 
tinually spitting fire and smoke. Though they have their 
occasional pyrotechnic displays, though many are rocky 
and barren with sheer bluffs rising three hundred and four 
hundred feet, others are flat, covered with grass and 
sheets of wild flowers in the summer and are the seat of 
fishing and other industries. To the south of the Aleu- 
tian Islands are the great cod banks, and cod fishing is one 
of the occupations of the people. Salmon is also caught 
and salted and there are some canneries. 

Unalaska is the most important island of the group. 
It is some one hundred and twenty miles long and forty 
miles broad and has a deeply indented shore line. The 
land is treeless, rather bold and rugged, and supports a 
good growth of native grass. It has a better climate for 
haying, it is said, than Oregon. The cattle raised here 
are fat, their meat is tender, and they give an abundance 
of milk. 

The principal settlements are Unalaska and Dutch 
Harbor, which though spoken of separately are practi- 
cally one, for they are only about half a mile apart. Here 
are the customs house, Russian Greek church, a Methodist 
mission, a native school and the houses of the little col- 
ony that make their home here. The place is also head- 



182 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

quarters for the fleet of revenue cutters that patrols 
Bering Sea to protect the seals. 

Dutch Harbor, which was so named because a Dutch 
vessel was the first to enter it, is one of the finest harbors 
of the North. Naval authorities say it could be easily 
fortified and made another Gibraltar and as such would 
be of value in protecting Hawaii and the Philippines. It 
would also make an excellent coaling station and with 
Alaska's coal fields opened and with a trade from Seattle 
to Siberia passing this way, for hither lies the shortest 
route, it would soon become an important seaport of the 
North. 

Unalaska was an important settlement during the Rus- 
sian occupancy, for it was the first colony reached from 
Kamchatka and boats put in here to be repaired and to 
bring the supplies the colony always so anxiously awaited. 

During the rush to Alaska in 1898 it had another ship 
building record, for here was probably one of the busiest 
shipyards in the United States at this time. Lumber, 
machinery and other equipment for the building of boats 
were shipped here from Seattle, a corps of carpenters and 
other mechanics were brought and here were constructed 
the boats and barges that plied on the Yukon during the 
years of the Klondike rush. More than a score of boats 
and barges were built here during one winter. 

The Aleutian Islands in addition to their fisheries and 
their possibilities of cattle raising have other valuable 
assets, some of these the result of their volcanic nature. 
There is much sulphur on the islands, especially in the 
vicinity of Dutch Harbor. If business enterprises de- 
velop here as it is expected they will, this sulphur, no 
doubt, will be commercially mined. 

On Unimak Island there is said to be a lake of sulphur 
in solution. In Louisiana a man has made a fortune 



To the Westward 183 

through mining sulphur by dissolving it and then evapo- 
rating the water. Some such process could be used here 
at half the cost, for the sulphur is already in solution. 

Amber is found on several of the islands, also obsidian, 
which the natives use for knives, spears and arrow heads. 
On one of the islands is an agate beach where these beauti- 
ful stones in colorings of pink, green, and yellow can be 
gathered by the sackful. 

The Aleutian Islands have often been compared to the 
highlands and adjacent islands of Scotland and it is be- 
lieved with the stimulation of certain industries the Aleu- 
tian Islands could as easily maintain a population as do 
these sections of the Old World. In Iceland four-fifths 
of the population of seventy thousand derive their main- 
tenance from agriculture and from pasturing flocks of 
sheep and cattle. Many of the Aleutian Islands are as 
suitable as Iceland if not more so, because of the prox- 
imity of the Japanese current, for such industries. 

The name given to these islands is said to come from 
the Indian word "Aliat" meaning an island. It is inter- 
esting to note that the names given by Indians were 
almost without exception significant. We use them with 
little thought of their meaning but when we do recall the 
Indian idea in them it adds a distinctive interest. 

The name Catherine Archipelago was given by the 
Russians in honor of Empress Catherine II. But the 
name Aleutian began gradually to be applied to some 
parts of the group and gradually was extended to all. 

The whole chain comprises an almost innumerable num- 
ber of islands, but those best known consist of four groups 
— the Fox Islands, to which Unimak and Unalaska be- 
long; the Andreanof or Andreanofski, named for their 
discoverer, to which belongs Atka ; the Rat Islands ; and 
the Near Islands, in which group is Attu. 



184 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Unimak Pass, the best passage to Bering Sea, lies be- 
tween Unimak Island and Akun Island. It is some two 
miles in width and makes a noble entrance to the waters 
beyond. Forbidding and tremendous masses of rock 
absolutely without vegetation or sign of life loom on each 
side. 

" A lonely land where no man comes, 
Nor has come since the making of the world," 

some one writes of it, as descriptive of the sense of lone- 
liness and desolation it gives. 

North of Aleutian Islands in Bering Sea, but not be- 
longing to them, are the Pribilof Islands, named for their 
discoverer, Gerassim Prybilof. The group consists of 
four small islands, St. Paul, St. George, Walrus and Bear, 
To the north of these is the St. Matthew group, consisting 
of St. Matthew, Pinnacle and Hall. On these islands are 
the seal herds now under the protection of the United 
States government. These islands are little more than 
rocks and sand, with small settlements of natives and gov- 
ernment officials. 

Still farther north is St. Lawrence Island, low with 
some prominent hills, and with a native settlement; and 
still northward in Bering Sea are the Diomede Islands, 
two small islands between which passes the boundary line 
between Russia and America. 

In the eastern part of Bering Sea, near the mainland, 
is Nunivak Island, a large island somewhat wooded and 
with many high hills. The natives of this island are 
known for the beauty of their ivory weapons and the grace 
and good workmanship of their boats. 



CHAPTER XIV 

FROM FAIRBANKS TO NOME VIA THE YUKON 

The lower Yukon and its history. Ruby. Nulato and 
ITS tragedy. The Western Union Telegraph expedition. 
St. Michael. Nome, its golden sands and the stam- 
pede in 1899. The Seward Peninsula and its resources. 
Life in this part of the world. The great annual 

DOG RACE KNOWN AS THE ALASKA DeRBY. 

Another part of Alaska that has had its gold romance 
is Nome and the Seward Peninsula. This section of 
Alaska came upon the world's horizon in '98 and '99 and 
held a prominent place there for several years. But though 
it was much discussed and much written about and though 
thousands visited it, the impression then and the impres- 
sion now is that it is a far northern section of Alaska, cold, 
dreary, uninhabitable. Whereas the fact is that Nome is 
in about the same latitude as Fairbanks and but little 
above that of Dawson. The people of Nome have their 
gardens in the summer and the tundra glows with wild 
flowers. The region is west rather than north. Cape 
Prince of Wales, its westernmost point, is three hundred 
miles west of the Sandwich Islands. The fact that Nome 
is on Bering Sea is probably the cause of this wrong 
impression, for to many the very name of Bering Sea 
brings visions of the Arctic Ocean and the North Pole. 

Nome can be reached by two routes. Both have feat- 
ures of interest. One is by way of Skagway, the White 
Pass and down the Yukon, the other by steamer direct 
from Seattle. Many who come down the Yukon take 
the trip up to Fairbanks to see this interior city of Alaska 

185 



186 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

and then return to the Yukon and continue the journey to 
its mouth. 

Scenically the lower Yukon is not so beautiful as the 
upper river, but historically it is considered by many to 
be more interesting. The Russians penetrated the lower 
Yukon and built their forts at various places along it. 
Some of these were the scenes of conflicts with the natives. 
Early exploring expeditions toiled up it, for in the early 
days it was a river of mystery. Few of the first settlers 
at its mouth or those who ascended it some distance 
thought this mighty stream was the same one that Hudson 
Bay agents spoke of in their reports to headquarters and 
called the Yukon. The Russians called it Kwikpak or 
Quikpak, an Eskimo name given to the mouth most used. 

If those who come down the river from White Horse 
go to Fairbanks they leave the Yukon at Tanana and re- 
turn to it at this point for their further journey. If they 
do not go to Fairbanks, they continue on down from here. 
In either case, boats are changed at Tanana, as the lower 
river steamers do not go beyond this point. 

The boat speeds down the Yukon, for the current is 
swift. The banks are wooded and the scenery pleasing. 
Kokrines, named for a Russian who first settled here, is 
one of the stopping places along this stretch of the river. 
It is little but a native village, a trading post, a church, 
and a government school. 

The first important settlement is Ruby, which is built 
on ground running up rather sharply from the river bank 
and with mountains beyond that gradually rise into dome- 
shaped peaks twelve hundred to fifteen hundred feet high. 
The town is about one hundred and seventy miles below 
Tanana, and the name is taken from that of a small creek 
on which gold was first found. The strike was made in 
1907, and miners came from Fairbanks, Rampart and 



From Fairbanks to Nome Via the Yukon 187 

nearly all near-by mining districts. Gold was found on 
several of the creeks back in the hills, and, as a conse- 
quence, a mining town started. It is now quite one of the 
largest settlements on this part of the river, with stores, 
hotels, restaurants, and homes. 

The scenery as the steamer glides on is pleasantly rest- 
ful. It has little of the rugged beauty of the stretches 
farther north but it has the charm of broader waters, and 
gentler shore lines. At times the banks rise in steep bluffs 
as of old but the general tendency is to softer outlines. 
Wooded islands dot the waters, adding a note of the pic- 
turesque. Toward the mouth of the Koyukuk a high bluff 
appears that is quite a landmark. On it is a cross for a 
Roman Catholic archbishop murdered in this vicinity and 
the bluff is known as the Bishop's Mountain. The Koyu- 
kuk River, which joins the Yukon here, is one of its large 
and important tributaries. 

Below the Koyukuk is one of the most historic trading 
posts on the river, Nulato. The Russians established a 
post here in 1838 which was burned by the Indians as was 
also another built the following year in its place. But in 
1841, Zagoskin came with a number of Russians, erected 
another fort and placated the Indians w^itli gifts and for 
a number of years the Russians carried on a good trade 
here with the natives. Zagoskin it was who said the 
Yukon was not navigable above Tanana. 

In 1851 Lieutenant Barnard of H. M. S. Enterprise 
arrived at Nulato in search of information regarding Sir 
John Franklin. Barnard had heard a report that en- 
couraged him to believe Franklin's party might have 
found a route over the mountains from the Arctic and he 
thought he might get some news from the Indians of this 
vicinity. He was a blunt Englishman unused to Indian 
ways and he remarked in the presence of some natives 



188 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

that he intended to " send " for the chief of a certain 
tribe to see if he could get the information he needed. The 
chief in question was near-by with a band of Indians. 
Though savages from a civiHzed point of view, the In- 
dians have a certain ceremonious etiquette in regard to 
meetings and visits. This chief in particular being a man 
of importance among the tribes, was not accustomed to 
being sent for, and when the remark was repeated to 
him he was highly offended. He consulted the medicine 
men of his tribe, and though at that time a better feeling 
in general prevailed than had in the past, the Indians still 
felt that the encroachments of the white men boded them 
no good, and the medicine men in particular were glad 
of an opportunity to make trouble. They advised the 
chief to resent this slur upon his dignity, go to the post 
and demand an apology and satisfaction. 

The matter would probably have ended amicably if at 
this juncture a Russian with an Indian companion had 
not appeared with the demand for the chief to come to the 
post. Both were murdered and it is said the flesh of the 
Russian was roasted and eaten. The Indians then de- 
scended upon the post, murdered the people there, includ- 
ing Lieutenant Barnard. When the news reached a post 
down the river through some who escaped, a rescuing 
party was sent. But it arrived too late to be of assistance. 
The dead were buried and over the grave of Lieutenant 
Barnard was erected a simple cross with the inscription : 

Lieutenant J. J. Barnard 
Of H. M. S. Enterprise 

Killed Feb. 16, 1851 
By the Koyukuk Indians 

Near the settlement is another grave of note, that of 
Robert Kennicott, who was prominently identified with 



From Fairbanks to Nome Via the Yukon 189 

explorations in the Northwest. In 1861 he made his way 
overland by the Hudson Bay route to Fort Yukon and in 
1865 was given charge of the expedition sent out by the 
Western Union Telegraph Company to survey a route by 
way of Alaska and Siberia to western Europe. He died 
in Nulato in 1866 and a simple board was erected to his 
memory, reading: 

In Memory of 

Robert Kennicott 

Naturalist 

Who Died Near This Place 

May 13, 1866, Aged Thirty 

This Western Union Telegraph Expedition did much 
for the exploration of this part of Alaska and in making 
it better known to the world. The failure of the Atlantic 
cable in 1858 led the company to seek some other route 
for reaching Europe and an expedition was sent to see if 
a line could not be established across Bering Sea and 
Siberia. The successful laying of the cable in 1866 made 
such an attempt unnecessary and the work was abandoned. 
William Henry Dall, who was appointed to take charge 
of the scientific corps after the death of Kennicott, made 
exhaustive studies of the region and wrote voluminously 
of its geography, natives and other matters. 

At present Nulato is but a small settlement of a few 
houses, stores, a native school and a telegraph station. 
Near Nulato the river narrows and bluffs appear, but as 
Kaltag, the next stopping place, is reached, the stream 
broadens and is dotted with wooded islands. Toward the 
east, mountains show on the horizon. Kaltag is the start- 
ing point of a winter trail across to Unalaklik, which 
shortens the route to Nome by five hundred miles. To 
the coast by this portage is some eighty to ninety miles 
whereas by the river it is six hundred. This trail is used 



190 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

in the winter by all crossing to Nome and the Seward 
Peninsula. 

For a long stretch now there are few settlements. The 
country is a great unpeopled wilderness, but this very 
loneliness and sense of the primeval lend a pleasure quite 
as enjoyable in its way as are the scenic and historic in- 
terests. 

On this stretch of the river the Shageluk, sometimes 
spelled Chageluk, slough leaves the Yukon, wanders some 
one hundred and twenty-five miles almost parallel and 
empties into the river again below Anvik. The islands in 
the river which break it up into many channels make it 
difficult to discover the entrance to the slough. 

Anvik, the next settlement of any importance, is rather 
attractively situated on a steep wooded ridge. A mission 
of the Episcopal church is here and the little native settle- 
ment, mission buildings and post office make a pleasing 
break in the river's monotony. 

A low, timbered country with hills on the horizon is 
about all the section has to offer in the way of scenery 
now, together with the gradual broadening of the stream. 

The next stopping place is Koserefsky or Holy Cross, 
the transfer point for the Iditerod country and a mission 
of the Roman Catholic church. This is quite one of the 
most prosperous missions on the river. The buildings are 
quite imposing and prettily situated near the river, the 
ground sloping upward back of them and covered with 
trees. There are a boarding-school with neat dormitories 
and pleasant schoolrooms, a church and flourishing gar- 
dens. The pupils are usually in uniforms, and the im- 
pression the little settlement creates is distinctly pleasing. 

Farther down the river is the Russian Mission or Ikog- 
mute. This was established in the early days, but condi- 
tions in Russia in the last few years have not been such as 



From Fairbanks to Nome Via the Yukon 191 

to aid Russian mission work. Hence the little post is not 
flourishing. The Yukon in this stretch comes close to the 
waters of the Kuskokwim River. In fact the distance be- 
tween the two is only about thirty miles. The land is low 
and there are many lakes so that a portage across is easy 
and the Russian traders and natives in the early days 
often crossed here between a post they had established on 
the Kuskokwim and this mission on the Yukon. 

There is little of interest now but the width of the 
river, for it is no longer a river but a sea. Andreaf ski, the 
next settlement, has quite a tragic history. It was built 
by the Russians about 1853 and at that time consisted of 
barracks, a store, magazine and a few other buildings. A 
small Indian village was near it but the natives seemed in 
every way friendly. Two years after it was built, how- 
ever, when a number of the garrison were away, the In- 
dians fell upon the remainder and killed them. A little 
Russian Creole escaped and carried the news to St. 
Michael. A party started from St. Michael bent upon 
revenge. They attacked the Indian village and in the 
most ferocious manner slew every one present. It is said 
that for many years afterwards the natives would not pass 
on the side of the river where the fort was, so acute was 
the memory of the barbarities of the Russian slaughter. 
The place is chiefly used now in the nature of a port, as 
there is none at the mouth of the river, and the steamers 
are harbored here for the winter. 

The country from here is desolate. For a brief time a 
few low hills are seen, but soon all is flat and marshy, the 
land being but a few feet above the water. The Yukon 
spreads through a labyrinth of outlets into Bering Sea 
and is heavily laden with silt and mud. No doubt the 
land through which it here flows has been built by the 
earth it has brought and will continue to be built farther 



192 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

and farther out into the ocean. Bleaching driftwood Hes 
piled on the flat shores or is partly buried in the mud and 
adds to the dreariness of the scene. 

From the mouth of the river a short run is made across 
St. Michael Slough to St. Michael. 

St. Michael has few attractions, unless the wide sweep 
of water in front be one, or the historical interest that 
attaches to the place. It is a small settlement consisting 
chiefly of storehouses and a hotel, so called, for the ac- 
commodation of those waiting for boats. Those coming 
from the outside make connections here with the river 
boats and those coming down the river also change here 
to seagoing craft. As the arrival of all these steamers is 
uncertain it is necessary to provide accommodations. The 
steamship companies endeavor to make close connections, 
but travelling in Alaskan waters, whether coastal or in- 
terior, is extremely uncertain and sometimes there is a 
lengthy wait at St. Michael for the expected boat. There 
is no harbor, and ocean going vessels anchor a mile or so 
off shore and barges transfer passengers and freight to 
and from the land. 

The settlement was founded in 1833 by the Russians 
and originally was called Michaeloffsky Redoubt. This 
location was chosen because it could be easily defended 
against the Indians. There is no growing timber on the 
island nor in the vicinity and the old Russian buildings 
were made of logs rafted down the river, hauled on 
sledges from the interior, or brought from Sitka or Si- 
beria. The Yukon brings down great quantities of drift- 
wood which is a boon to those living in the timberless 
tracts of this section for it answers for firewood and for 
building purposes. 

From St. Michael the route to Nome lies across Norton 
Bay, an arm of Bering Sea. The steamer takes a direct 



From Fairbanks to Nome Via the Yukon 193 



course across the water but the shore Hne bends in and 
on it are various little settlements. Unalaklik is one of 
these. This is the ocean end of the winter trail across 
from Kaltag. It is an Eskimo settlement principally. 
Bluff, on the coast some fifty miles from Nome, is a 
mining town, and at one time mining in the winter on 
the floor of Bering Sea was done near here. Shafts were 
frozen down until the bottom was reached and then the 
sand was hoisted. 

This method of mining is unique, but as the floor of 
Bering Sea is believed to contain much gold, this plan 
for getting it was resorted to. A shaft is cut down 
through the ice until unfrozen water is reached. The 
cold air rushing in, however, soon freezes this water, 
when the shaft is again cut downward until water is once 
more reached. This process is repeated until a shaft 
with solid walls of ice is sunk to the sea floor. Then 
the sand is lifted and the gold sluiced out in the usual 
way. 

The first sight that is apt to greet the gaze as Nome is 
approached is Sledge Island, a great upheaval of bare 
rock that lies like some giant, couchant animal in the road- 
stead. It was given the name by Captain Cook because of 
a sledge with bone runners that was found here. Grim 
and stark as it looks, it at times performs a friendly office. 
Nome has no harbor and when a storm comes up the 
vessels lying in the roadstead scurry for the lee of Sledge 
Island for protection. 

To those visiting it for the first time, Nome, like Daw- 
son, is a place of romantic interest. But if they came by 
the outside passage from Seattle and it is the first Alaskan 
town to be seen, it is apt to be a keen disappointment. For 
Nome, as the steamer approaches it, is not attractive. 
Viewed from the water, it seems to be a collection of 



194 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

small, mostly unpainted buildings scattered in disorderly- 
fashion along the waterfront and up over the tundra. But 
the situation is not without its pleasing lines and color, 
especially if the day is clear. Bering Sea sweeps in here 
in a gentle curve that runs for possibly thirty miles be- 
tween two outjutting points, Cape Nome at one end and 
West Point at the other. In this little shallow bay lies 
Nome, the tundra climbing up gradually back of it to a 
low range of hills. Far inland can be seen the jagged 
peaks of the Sawtooth Mountains, sometimes snow cov- 
ered. It is a gentle beauty with a coloring in low tones of 
slate and purple except when Bering Sea is a vivid blue 
and the peaks in the distance shine in a robe of pure 
white or when one of Alaska's glorious sunsets bathes 
the scene in a flood of red and gold. 

Landing at Nome is an unique operation. The boat 
does not go up to a dock and the passengers walk off 
by the gang plank as is the usual method. There are no 
piers of this kind at Nome. There are large warehouses 
along the waterfront for the storage of merchandise, but 
the steamers themselves do not come within a mile and 
a half or two miles of the shore. Passengers and freight 
are taken ashore in lighters and small boats. If the water 
is smooth these are beached or tied up to the warehouse 
wharf. If the water is rough the landing is made at some 
distance from the shore on a small staging anchored in 
the sea. Passengers are then loaded into a sort of mam- 
moth basket or cage and swung by cable high over the 
waves in and on to the dock. The experience is not with- 
out its thrills and is certainly new to many travellers. It 
is said that Snake River, which empties into the sea at 
the western end of the town, could be dredged and a good 
harbor made that would not only reduce the cost of get- 
ting passengers and freight ashore at Nome but make a 




A STREET SCENE, NOME 



From Fairbanks to Nome Via the Yukon 195 

safe harbor for the boats. The item of cost especially in 
regard to freight is great, for wages are high in Alaska. 
The need of a safe harbor is also imperative. Storms 
descend unexpectedly at Nome and vessels in the road- 
stead have no place to go for shelter except the lee of 
Sledge Island, which is not exactly the sort that cautious 
captains prefer. 

Nome is not large numerically, but it has a number of 
modern, prosperous stores, several hotels, large ware- 
houses, a number of churches, a good school and hospital 
and telephone and wireless service. Though out of the 
world geographically, it is by no means out of it pro- 
gressively. It has many charming homes, and almost 
every little house has its garden where lettuce, radishes, 
cabbage, turnips and other vegetables flourish. And 
indoors and outdoors, wherever flowers will grow, are 
blossoms. 

On what is called the sand spit, a stretch of beach be- 
tween Snake River and the ocean, is the Eskimo village. 
One sees the natives here in all stages of progress, from 
the little bright-eyed youngsters who go to the native 
school and speak English, the courteous polite older boys 
and girls who have graduated from these schools, to the 
old men and women, blear-eyed and dirty, who still cling 
to native ways of living and eating and are anything but 
pleasant to look upon. The village is a combination of 
frame houses, tents, racks upon which fish are drying, 
boats, dogs and smells. It is interesting, but not invit- 
ing. Here can be seen in great numbers the oomiak, the 
Eskimo boat made of skin. These boats are pictures of 
grace and lightness, and to see them as they are paddled 
away from the shore filled with Eskimos and their be- 
longings on their voyage to winter quarters at Cape Prince 
of Wales is a picture long remembered. The helpless 



196 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



looking open boat, the bleak sea, the cheerless, desolate, 
hard winter life to which they are going, the unrepining 
courage with which they face it, all make a scene that 
stands out vividly in recollections of Nome. 

The Nome shops are filled with the handiwork of the 
Eskimo, carved ivory, baskets, beadwork, moccasins. 
These natives meet you in the street with their wares, and 
with a smile and glance ask you to buy. They are a pleas- 
ant, friendly people given to but few words but their shy 
smile and bright eyes have greater selling power than 
language. Their carved ivories are monuments of pa- 
tient, tireless industry and of no little artistic skill. Crib- 
bage boards, paper knives, many kinds of small figures 
ornamented with fish, seal, and other animals with which 
they are familiar, are the most popular pieces. Some are 
made from old ivory, a soft, lovely shade of brown. But 
all as specimens of the handwork and artistic faculties of 
this primitive people are interesting. 

Nome, like other Alaska mining towns, came into being 
with a rush. In July, 1898, a boat containing some pros- 
pectors on their way to Golovin Bay capsized at the mouth 
of Snake River. The men, after drying out, prospected a 
bit and found some colors, but not equal to the hopes they 
entertained of the Golovin Bay country, the reports of 
which had brought them to this section. Disappointment, 
however, met them at Golovin, and telling others of their 
find in the Cape Nome section, they returned. Many came 
with them and the strike that eventually made this section 
known to the world as a rich gold producing region was 
made in September on Anvil Creek near-by. Although the 
season was late, the ground freezing and snow falling, 
eighteen hundred dollars was panned and rocked out in a 
few days. 

The news spread to other mining camps, and in the 



From Fairbanks to Nome Via the Yukon 197 

spring of '99 miners came from even far away Dawson. 
The work so far was only on the creeks. But, so the story 
goes, one of these newcomers had scurvy and went to the 
beach to take the old time whaler's cure of sun and salt 
water. He employed his time in his free, open-air sana- 
torium in panning and thus discovered Nome's golden 
sands that brought a rush of men and women here from 
many parts of the world. 

The beach was " No Man's Land," for the government 
had reserved the stretch between the sea and high water 
for wharfage purposes. No claim could be located on it, 
but it could be worked anywhere by any one. This 
lack of title or ownership led of course to quarrels and 
much disorder until the matter was taken in hand by a 
miners' meeting and the decision was made that each man 
should have to work as his own as much ground as he 
could reach with his shovel from the edge of the hole 
where he was digging. 

But the news of this public instead of private ownership 
of the land and of the fact that the gold could be easily 
^vashed out because of the abundance of water right at 
hand made many believe that fortunes could be made 
over night, and not only brought a tremendous number of 
people but they were in many cases less fitted both as to 
experience and supplies than is the usual stampeder to a 
gold camp. In contrast to this class were many who, be- 
cause the gold was to be taken from beach sand without 
the necessity of digging shafts, clearing away rocks and 
mining in the customary fashion, had brought all sorts of 
strange devices for securing the gold more quickly than 
by panning or rocking. 

As a result, within a few months fifteen thousand 
people with all sorts of machinery overflowed the place. 
The beach was a scene of inextricable confusion. There 



198 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

were no wharves or docks and in among the workers and 
their contraptions were piled thousands of tons of freight. 
Far up the beach it was jumbled. Everything was in an 
appalling state of confusion. Machinery, all sorts of sup- 
plies, hay, lumber, grain, hardware, provisions, liquor, 
tents, stoves, pianos, sewing machines, mirrors, bar fix- 
.tures, anything and everything, was thrown here regard- 
less of weather or damage. Transportation along the 
beach was by wagon and ten dollars an hour was exacted 
and a wagon could only haul a few hundred pounds at a 
snail's pace, or by launch, for which five hundred dollars 
a day was charged. To get one's goods out of this con- 
fusion and away to a place of storage was a slow and 
costly proceeding. 

In some cases fortunes were quickly made. Two men 
rocking three days cleaned up nearly four thousand dol- 
lars. Gold to the value of two million was extracted in 
a short time. One man made quite a bit in an unusual 
way. He had shrewdly brought with him two dilapidated 
rockers which he had bought from Eskimos at St. 
Michael for twenty-five cents each. Lumber in Nome was* 
scarce and many of the stampeders had no rockers. In- 
stead of working the beach himself he rented the rockers 
on a royalty basis of fifty per cent and in less than two 
weeks had realized almost three thousand dollars. 

Of course the sands were soon exhausted and the min- 
ers spread back into the hills and out into other parts of 
Seward Peninsula and other gold discoveries were made. 
A few years later a rich strike was made near Anvil 
Mountain, a low peak a few miles from Nome and so 
named because a rock on its summit resembles an anvil. 
This find alone in one year yielded a million dollars. Most 
of the creeks in this section have made rich returns. A 
mining expert has said that within the range of vision 



From Fairbanks to Nome Via the Yukon 199 



from Anvil Mountain is a richer placer gold area than 
is to be found elsewhere in the world. 

The region about Nome is now looked upon as one of 
Alaska's permanent gold areas. Both the individual min- 
ers and large companies are at work here, and when other 
developments come that will make mining a less costly 
operation than it is at present the output from this sec- 
tion will increase. Both dredging and hydraulicking are 
done and the headquarters of some of these companies 
are veritable little towns. The men are provided with 
neat, comfortable buildings for sleeping, with a big, well- 
lighted room for reading, writing and recreation. There 
are messhouses, storehouses, and buildings for the ma- 
chinery. To come upon one of these places hidden in a 
hollow or on the banks of a little creek on the lonely, des- 
olate tundra seems like going at one step from the pri- 
meval wilderness to the heart of civilization. 

A problem that complicates mining in this section is 
the lack of water. The creeks are small and in summer 
often dry up. Snake River and Nome River, the two 
largest streams, are limited in the areas they can serve. It 
is impossible to mine without water. The large companies 
have built ditches to bring water over miles of tundra 
from the mountains. It takes capital to do this, and so 
the small companies and the individual miner if they can- 
not buy water are hampered in their work and their out- 
put much curtailed. 

Gold has been found in many other sections of Seward 
Peninsula. At Solomon to the east of Nome; at Coun- 
cil about eighty miles to the northeast in the interior; at 
Teller, on the coast to the northwest; at Candle, across 
the peninsula to the north on Kotzebue Sound, an inlet of 
the Arctic Ocean, at all these places the precious metal has 
been discovered. 



200 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Teller has a good harbor, about the only good natural 
harbor on the northern coast of Bering Sea. Teller is, as 
well, the gateway to the Kougarok and Bluestone districts, 
in both of which gold has been discovered. It is a pictur- 
esque place. On the right is a long, low sandspit and on 
the left the Cape York coast, where a bare, rough range of 
hills that drop off into Bering Sea mark the end of the 
great Rocky Mountain system of the western continent. 

The discovery of gold at Candle is due, legend says, to 
the ghost of an Indian who sat or stood, data are not ex- 
act, on the prow of the prospector's boat who found the 
gold and directed him where to go. Whether the prospec- 
tor saw the Indian's spirit or not no one can tell, but it is 
known that he put out into Bering Sea in an open boat, 
steered through Bering Strait into the Arctic Ocean, 
thence into Kotzebue Sound and made a strike where 
other prospectors had been several Aears before and found 
nothing. 

Some of these districts on the Seward Peninsula have 
proven very rich. One claim near Council yielded three 
tons of gold. Just what wealth this section of Alaska 
holds, however, no one can say. Mining at present here 
is under too great handicaps to reach its fullest develop- 
ment. There are no railroads at present. There are prac- 
tically no roads. Near some of the towns there is a short 
stretch of government road. The rest is tundra. Tundra 
is a bog, a wet, mushy place of hummocks or " nigger 
heads " and black muck. In this horses and wagons mire 
sometimes every few yards. Transporting supplies over 
it is a long and costly process. Much of the hauling, 
therefore is done in winter over the snow. But all sup- 
plies must reach Nome in the summer, therefore, if 
freighted in winter to the camps, they must be stored and 
thus handled twice. The cost of this in addition to the 



From Fairbanks to Nome Via the Yukon 201 

cost of landing, due to the lack of harbor facilities, makes 
mining an extremely expensive industry in the Seward 
Peninsula. Quartz ledges have been found and their de- 
velopment will no doubt become one of the permanent 
industries of the section when the cost of mining is 
lowered. 

Other minerals have also been discovered. Among 
them tin is noteworthy. The tin deposits are said to be 
very rich. Silver and coal have also been located. 

All these mining interests look to Nome as the central 
point for their supplies and their means of communica- 
tion with the outside world. This makes the town a bus- 
tling little place. Small steamers go up and down the coast 
carrying provisions to the settlements along shore. Freight 
teams wind in and out over the tundra hauling goods to 
near-by camps. In the outskirts, even at times in Nome 
itself, dredges are working. A few years ago right on 
Front Street, Nome, a dredge was scooping up the earth, 
washing out its gold, and leaving the debris in unsightly 
tailings along its course. The big warehouse companies 
are busy receiving and shipping goods. For all Nome's 
business must be done in a few short months. The first 
steamer arrives in the early part of June, the last one 
leaves in October. Between these two dates the business 
of the year with the outside world must be crowded. In 
October the ice begins to come down from the north. At 
first a few floating cakes are reported. Next the sea 
takes on a mushy look. Then some morning, Nome 
awakes to find itself locked in the arms of a sea of ice, 
and communication with the outside, except by wireless 
or dog team, is cut oi¥ till spring. 

The winter season is not a dull time in Nome. Shut in 
as the people are and dependent upon themselves for en- 
joyment, the townspeople are like one big family. All 



202 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

sorts of entertainments are given, and there are few days 
without some diversion to enliven them. The great event 
of the winter is the Dog Race, the Alaska Derby, as it is 
called, held under the auspices of the Kennel Club. For 
the unexpected and exciting and as a test of speed and 
endurance it is doubtful if it has its equal in any sport in 
the world. Over hundreds of miles of snow-swept 
wastes the route lies, between towering ice hummocks 
on Bering Sea, over wide plains of unbroken snow, up 
and down steep hillsides, through desolate valleys where 
the fierce north wind, laden with fine particles of ice and 
snow, sweeps, over trackless and treacherous ice of rivers 
and lakes. Nowhere else does the world know such a 
race course. 

The number of dogs in the team is optional, but be- 
tween ten and twenty is the average, and, to prevent 
cruelty, the ruling is that every dog with which the team 
started out must be brought back dead or alive. The 
sleds are made of hickory lashed with reindeer sinews and 
walrus hide. The only equipment is an assortment of 
furs and water bottles for the men, canton flannel moc- 
casins for the dogs' feet, dark veils for the eyes and 
blankets for use in case the wind is keen. 

The dogs are not driven by rein but by spoken order, 
and an intelligent leader is a prime necessity. The driver 
rarely sits on the sled but runs behind, jumping on and 
off the runners and pushing when necessary. 

The drivers can use their own discretion as to the num- 
ber and length of stops, one of course being stipulated at 
Candle, the end of the first half of the race, where the 
teams are examined and checked up by the judges. When 
resting the dogs are rubbed with alcohol and fed and 
bedded before the men attend to their own needs. 

The food is distributed by the commissary team con- 



From Fairbanks to Nome Via the Yukon 203 

trolled by the club, and is so divided into separate allow- 
ances that no time is lost in preparing and allotting it. 
Through the year the dogs are fed on a general diet of 
rolled oats, dried salmon, household scraps and the flesh 
of the white whale. But during the race they are given 
chopped mutton and beef mixed with eggs. 

The purses are from ten dollars to three thousand and 
the course is to Candle and return, a distance altogether 
of four hundred and twelve miles. Although the race is 
indulged in as a sport and is one of the eagerly-awaited 
events of the season, it has its utilitarian value. The 
desire to win the race leads to efforts to improve the 
breed of dogs, and helps instil greater intelligence and 
humanity in the dog users. These results have become so 
marked that Nome dogs have become famous and many 
Arctic explorers when they need dogs for Arctic travel 
send to Nome for them. 

The summer visitor to Nome does not, however, have 
an opportunity to see the dog race, though he will hear 
about it, see pictures of the winning team, and perhaps 
see some of the dogs themselves. Nor does he have a 
chance to take a sleigh ride behind a dog team, another 
favorite winter diversion. But he is not cut off alto- 
gether from dog travelling. He may get a chance to go 
out to the creeks by the " pupmobile," or he may get a 
ride in a boat drawn by dogs. Both are exhilarating. 

The pupmobile is a flat car drawn by dogs that runs on 
a narrow gauge track out over the tundra, to some of the 
creeks. This mode of travel is a swift if somewhat hap- 
hazard proceeding. The dogs seem to look on it as a 
grand frolic and tear along at a mad pace. If a car is 
seen coming in the other direction, one removes his car 
from the track while the other passes. Sometimes when 
going down hill the dogs are loaded on the car. 



204 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

The trip by boat is quite as exhilarating. The boat 
itself, if the work of natives, is worth study, for it is 
usually a beautiful bit of workmanship. It is of drift- 
wood fastened together with leather thongs and covered 
with skin stretched so carefully and sewn so well as to be 
watertight. It is light yet staunch and skims the water 
like a bird. 

You step in carefully, for a boat of skin, no matter how 
taut, seems frail in comparison with the wood and steel 
craft with which one is familiar. The Eskimo runs it 
out to where the water is sufficiently deep and climbs in. 
All this time the dogs sit idly by as if not concerned at 
all with what is going on, but the moment the boat reaches 
water in which it floats and swings around parallel to the 
shore, they spring into harness, the tow-line connecting 
them with the boat becomes taut and they start off down 
the beach. The Indian in the bow of the boat keeps the 
line steady, raising it when necessary to insure clearing 
driftwood, while the man in the stern steers the boat just 
outside the edge or wash of the breakers. 

The voyage resembles the flight of a sea gull more than 
a boat trip. One moment the little craft is lifted on the 
crest of a wave with what seems the certainty of its being 
dashed to pieces on the beach or rocks. The next minute 
it is down in the trough of the sea with nothing visible 
but the waves and the leather thong connecting it with 
the shore. Up it comes again, this time perhaps riding 
high above the dogs with the tow-line clear of the water, 
and one seems to be flying through the air. Nothing is 
heard but the splash of the surf and the occasional shouts 
of the Eskimos. You are twice glad on this trip, when 
you start and when you stop. 

About sixty miles back in the interior from Nome is 
Hot Springs. If one has not yet seen any of Alaska's hot 



From Fairbanks to Nome Via the Yukon 205 

springs, a trip is worth while. It will seem more novel 
here perhaps than elsewhere, for the change from the 
vegetation of the tundra to the green, luxuriant growth 
here affords more of a contrast than it does in some other 
places in Alaska. Lettuce, celery, mushrooms and many 
vegetables flourish almost as well here as in a tropic 
garden. 



CHAPTER XV 

LITTLE KNOWN REGIONS OF ALASKA 

The Arctic Plain eastward from Seward Peninsula. The 

KOYUKUK REGION. ThE ChANDALAR, KoBUK AND COLVILLE 

RIVERS. The Kuskokwim country. Its agricultural pos- 
sibilities. Iditerod and ITS mining interests. 

Two large regions of Alaska are as yet little explored. 
One of these is the great Arctic plain stretching eastward 
from the Seward Peninsula to the Canadian border and 
from the Yukon River to the Arctic Ocean. At a 
rough guess this vast region comprises about one-third of 
Alaska, yet it is comparatively unknown. A few Arctic 
explorers have been over it. The Boundary Commission 
crossed its eastern end. Prospectors have partially pene- 
trated it northward from the Yukon. But, in the main, 
it still remains a great unknown territory, fascinating 
because of the very mystery that enshrouds it and the 
secrets it holds in its bosom. 

Though more difficult to explore than some parts of 
Alaska, it has its advantages. Supplies can be taken 
easily and in quantity to its very threshold. Game is 
abundant. In fact one scientist who has made the trip 
across it says there is sufficient game, wild vegetables and 
berries to sustain life and that he could travel all the way 
from the Yukon to the shores of the Arctic Ocean with 
nothing but blanket, matches, gun and axe. Vilhjalmur 
Stefansson has said, " I have demonstrated that civilized 
man can live on the products of the Arctic, having on one 

206 



Little Eno"wn Eegions of Alaska 207 

occasion been two years away from supply ships and 
living as an Eskimo." 

The prospector, however, is the one who has chiefly 
invaded this region. Nothing daunts him when in search 
of gold, and from time to time reports of the discovery 
of gold in this section have come out and miners have 
made their way thither. Tiny mining settlements and 
cabins of lonely miners are scattered here and there 
through it, but the mining is done on a small scale and 
in the most primitive fashion. To the miner with lim- 
ited funds and who cannot spend his time hunting, the 
cost of getting in supplies for a stay of any length or of 
bringing in machinery for mining in any extensive 
fashion is prohibitive. 

Several fair-sized rivers find their way through the 
territory and afford the easiest and cheapest means of 
transportation for goods. It is on these rivers that the 
few settlements are located and on them and near-by 
creeks most of the mining is at present being carried 
on. 

The largest of these streams is the Koyukuk River. 
This is some seven hundred miles long and navigable for 
a considerable part of the distance. It empties into the 
Yukon at Nulato and here boats are taken for the jour- 
ney up the stream. 

The trip on the lower part of the river is monotonous. 
The current is slack, the channel winding. The shores 
are densely wooded, islands dot the water and a lonely, 
dilapidated cabin here and there gives a note of deso- 
lation. Gradually the banks grow rockier, mountains 
begin to appear and the current gets a bit swifter. In 
one place are rapids to which the miners making their 
way up the river in small boats have given the expressive 
name of the " Measly Chute." At Allakaket, one of the 



208 Alaska, Giir Beantifni Northland 



principal settlements, is a high bluff from which extends 
a plateau. In the old days this was a meeting place 
for the Indians for trading purposes. This high, open, 
flat stretch was chosen as it prevented ambuscades, proof 
that the natives had no great confidence in each other. 
From here onward the navigation becomes increasingly- 
difficult as numerous bars and sloughs appear. At last 
Bettles is reached, practically the head of navigation and 
the chief settlement of the river. 

The town is the usual little mining community of log 
houses, a few stores and other buildings. Back of the 
town rises Lookout Mountain, so called because from its 
top can be seen the first steamboat on its way up the river 
in the spring, an event as eagerly awaited as is the first 
boat at Nome when the ice breaks up. For this little 
settlement, like Nome, is cut off from the outside world 
in winter except by dog sled, and as it has practically no 
business interests to bring travellers, its visitors are few. 
Because it is so dependent upon itself, it is said to be one 
of the most hospitable camps in the North. Newcomers 
are more than cordially welcomed, and any one coming 
who is in hard luck is told to take a pan and go out and 
help himself. 

From Lookout Mountain can also be obtained a good 
view of the surrounding country, which is somewhat 
timbered with spruce. Lakes gleam here and there in 
the green setting and to the north can be seen the peaks 
of the Endicott Mountains. These mountains form the 
watershed between the rivers on the south and those that 
flow into the Arctic Ocean. They are broken by broad 
passes and have many valleys. Some of the peaks rise 
to a height of from seven to nine thousand feet. 

The region is not by any means unattractive and would 
well repay in picturesque scenery, in the pleasure of fish- 



Little Known Regions of Alaska 209 

ing and hunting, and the zest of exploring the unknown, 
a summer's sojourn. 

Beyond Bettles freight and supplies are sent on by- 
horse scows. These are large flat boats with an inter- 
changeable propelling power of gas engines and horses 
as the current permits. 

To the northward from Bettles, the river divides into 
various forks. On the Middle Fork the scenery is quite 
picturesque. The river passes through a canyon, the 
channel is narrow, the banks steep, and here and there in 
the stream are detached rock masses that have been 
eroded into the semblance of various human figures. One 
of these, because of its likeness to a bishop in his vest- 
ments, has been called Bishop's Rock. Another has been 
called the Squaw Rock from its resemblance to an Indian 
woman. 

On this fork is Coldfoot, said to be so named because 
the miners who had come this far into the wilderness 
became timid about going farther. It lies at the base of 
a circle of rugged peaks and is little but a roadhouse, a 
few stores and cabins. It is the centre of a small mining 
region, gold having been discovered on several creeks in 
the neighborhood. It claims to be the farthest north gold 
mining town in the world and is at any rate the most 
northerly postal station in this part of Alaska. It has 
not the prosperity of its earlier days. The gold is not 
panning out as richly as was expected and the cost of 
mining here is much greater than in almost any other 
camp in Alaska. It can also be reached up the Chandalar 
and thence by portage. But whichever route is chosen, 
the journey means much rehandling of all supplies 
brought in the summer by boats. 

Across a short portage from Coldfoot are the upper 
waters of the Chandalar, another stream of this region 



210 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

that has its lure of gold and, as a consequence, a few 
mining camps. The name is said to be a corruption of 
Gens de Large, a title given by the Hudson Bay Company 
to a tribe of Indians who had no permanent village but 
lived in encampments along this stream. A lake to the 
eastward still retains this name. 

The Chandalar empties into the Yukon near Fort 
Yukon and is navigable at its flood season a short dis- 
tance for light draught boats, though such navigation is 
no easy matter. The banks are wooded, and as the river 
is ascended the scenery grows more attractive. The cur- 
rent is shallow and swift. Here and there are rapids, 
and mountains three to six thousand feet high appear. 
The river has several forks but the whole section of its 
northern courses is hilly. This region is a quartz country 
but has not been worked owing to the cost of getting in 
machinery. There are a few small mining camps along 
the river and its branches. The chief settlement is 
Caro. 

Of the rivers that empty into the Arctic the Kobuk 
is perhaps the best known. Its waters flow into Kotzebue 
Sound, an inlet of the Arctic Ocean. 

The Kobuk is a large stream said to be about four 
hundred miles long. The name is an Eskimo word 
meaning " Big River." It rises in the mountains near 
the headwaters of the Koyukuk and a glance at the map 
will show that in its westward journey to the Arctic it 
covers a long stretch of territory. 

This region in many parts is mountainous and wooded 
and the upper courses of the stream are picturesque. 
Game and fish abound. But as the river nears its outlet, 
the country is desolate, barren and much like that of 
the lower stretches of the Yukon. 

Not only has gold been found throughout this section 



Little Known Regions of Alaska 211 

but rich specimens of silver and copper have been dis- 
covered. Some have assayed phenomenal values, the 
copper in particular showing as high as eight-seven per 
cent. There is also said to be coal here, and what is 
almost unknown in Alaska, jade. Jade Mountain is in 
this section where in times past the Indians gathered this 
mineral for tipping their arrows. With the coming of 
more peaceful days they now make it into ornaments. 

The Colville River is the farthest north of all these 
rivers and flows northward directly into the Arctic 
Ocean. It is a wide stream with a strong current and 
at its mouth spreads out like most Alaska rivers over a 
wide reach of flats where stranded icebergs sparkle in 
the sun, in summer. In winter it is a region of ice hum- 
mocks and gray dreary gloom. 

The valley through which the river flows is from fifty 
to a hundred miles wide and is hemmed in by low barren 
hills. 

In tkia region coal has been found by the few prospec- 
tors who have visited it, and petroleum is said to be here 
also. Float coal has been picked up and used by the 
prospectors for their camp fires. Stefansson also speaks 
of finding coal in this Arctic region, though his explora- 
tions were farther to the eastward in Canadian territory. 

Just what the future of this great section of Alaska 
will be no one can venture to guess. If the coal and 
oil could be developed they would help marvellously in 
opening up the country, and would be useful also to the 
whaling vessels and to the few other boats that venture 
into the Arctic in these regions. But such development 
does not seem at all probable. These treasures will most 
likely remain locked in these Arctic regions until eco- 
nomic pressure makes their use inevitable. Then rail- 
roads will be built through the trackless wilderness, and 



212 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



these stores that have been reserved for this time of need 
will be poured forth. 

The second large region of Alaska that is as yet little 
explored is the area extending westward from the Alaska 
Range to the Yukon River and from Bering Sea to the 
Tanana River. It is spoken of in a general way as the 
Kuskokwim country, and, roughly speaking, composes 
about one-fourth of Alaska. 

It is not so inaccessible as some parts of Alaska that 
have been more largely developed. The Kuskokwim 
River, the second largest river in Alaska and navigable 
for some five hundred miles, penetrates it. The Kan- 
tishna, a stream that empties into the Tanana River, can 
be ascended for some distance and the region approached 
in this way. The country can be reached from the Yukon 
by way of Iditerod, and passes through the Alaska Range 
permit entrance from the east. Nor is it a barren, unin- 
habitable country. Though game and fish in some parts 
of it are not so plentiful as in some other parts of Alaska 
there is sufficient to sustain life. Wild berries abound 
and the forage grasses for horses grow luxuriantly. Yet 
it has been little explored and scarcely at all developed. 

This condition is probably due to the fact that no rich 
gold strike has been made here, for in Alaska it is the 
prospector whose finger records the pulse of its develop- 
ment. Let him make a good strike and the world flocks 
to the door he has opened. Let him report no prospects 
and the section remains neglected. 

Yet the Kuskokwim country is said to have rich re- 
sources by those who know Alaska, and it is believed by 
these that it will become one of its most prosperous 
regions. " I never saw a more beautiful sight," enthu- 
siastically said a prospector who had been through there, 
" than the view that met my eyes when I crossed the 



Little Known Regions of Alaska 213 

mountains and came out on a point where the great 
Kuskokwim valley stretched before me. It was mag- 
nificent. Some day that will be a fine farming country." 

The Kuskokwim River has its source in three forks 
that rise on the western slopes of the great Alaska Range. 
There are also other rivers and streams here that are 
tributary to it, so that the region is one of valleys, some 
broad and fertile, others narrow and hilly, and of swamps 
and flat marshy country. After these streams unite, the 
Kuskokwim flows through a broad definite valley with 
rounded, level-topped low mountains. The scenery is 
not unlike that of some parts of the Yukon. Farther 
down the mountains draw nearer, the valley is narrower 
and some high, isolated peaks covered with snow the year 
through, show. At places the river bluffs are from five 
to six hundred feet high and from them stretches a broad 
upland plateau. At Kolmakof , a Russian settlement, the 
river is nearly a mile wide and has an unobstructed chan- 
nel, with islands here and there covered with willows 
and alders. Farther down the low flat tundra appears 
with small swampy lakes in its expanse. For a long 
distance above the river mouth not even a tall bush is 
to be seen. The whole region is a level swamp covered 
with a few feet of peat. 

It is in the valleys, the broad valley of the Kuskokwim, 
and the small valleys of the other streams, that the agri- 
cultural and grazing possibilities of this great region lie. 
The summers are warm with but little rain. The win- 
ters are clear with but little extreme changes or heavy 
snows. In the valleys it is believed all kinds of vege- 
tables can be grown, though the soil will have to be thor- 
oughly worked and fertilized. Wild berries, native 
grasses shoulder high suitable for cattle, spruce, birch 
and poplar are all found here. In the small mining set- 



214 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

tlements vegetables are already being raised. At one of 
these places several acres have been cleared, and one 
season more than six tons of potatoes were raised, which 
were sold at a good price to the miners. 

In regard to the native grasses, a member of a gov- 
ernment party that came through here to survey said that 
in no locality in Alaska had he seen such a luxuriant 
growth of native redtop grass, and he is a man who knows 
Alaska well. 

In some of these valleys and on the hillsides, this same 
surveying party had to cut through miles of dense inter- 
twined alder thickets. In the central Kuskokwim valley 
is a good growth of spruce and birch. This grows in 
little groves with grass about instead of underbrush and 
gives a pleasing parklike aspect to the scenery. The 
spruce is different from the usual spruce of the interior 
as it has branches that grow to the ground and is more 
dignified and impressive than its smaller sister of the 
Yukon region. 

Gold has been discovered on some of the streams and 
about $500,000 mined. Coal is also found. Prospec- 
tors say they have picked up enough in stream beds for 
their camp fires. Copper and cinnabar are also among 
the minerals of this region. The cinnabar is found at 
various points along the river, the chief deposit so far 
being near Kolmakof in a cliff on the river bank. But 
the region is so large and as yet so little known that what 
its resources are no one can state. 

The discovery of minerals has brought a few settle- 
ments. These newer settlements are on the upper river 
and are little more than mining camps. On the lower 
river, however, are some that date back to earlier days. 
In 1832, Lukeen, a Russian Creole, with a party of na- 
tives built some log houses on the river at a point quite 



Little Known Regions of Alaska 215 

a distance from its mouth, the Httle settlement becoming 
known as Lukeen's Fort. Eventually it was burnt, but 
some years later other Russians came and the place was 
rebuilt and named Kolmakof for the leader of this later 
expedition. It is therefore the oldest settlement on the 
river and important of its kind. 

Farther down the river is Bethel, an Indian village 
with a mission of the Moravian church. This, too, is of 
a permanent character, and though not large is of help 
in developing the country. 

Westward from the Kuskokwim River to the Yukon 
is the Iditerod country. There is more development here 
than in the Kuskokwim region because gold was found 
here in 1906 and for a time hopes were entertained that 
this would prove another of Alaska's rich placer sections. 
Miners left their claims on the Koyukuk River, on the 
creeks around Fairbanks, on the Tanana and upper 
Yukon, some coming even as far as from Fortymile and 
Dawson. Nome, too, was not without its excitement at 
the news, for the tale of a strike in Alaska is like a stone 
thrown into water. The circle spreads until it penetrates 
little camps far on the outskirts of the wilderness and the 
news is discussed in log cabins and tiny settlements and, 
singly and in groups, miners can be seen mushing to the 
new discovery, or if it can be reached by boat, crowding 
the steamers to be among the first arrivals. 

The Iditerod and its contiguous territory the Innoko 
region, in which gold was discovered about the same 
time, were no exceptions, although there was no such 
rush as to Dawson, Nome or Fairbanks for the finds were 
by no means so rich. But the element of uncertainty 
that enters into a gold strike is part of the lure. Nobody 
knows what may be found and so the stampeders come, 
hoping that this is the time they will strike it rich. 



216 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

" One more trip for that golden treasure 
That will last you all your life," 

is the siren song that ever sounds in their ears. 

As the result of the rush, Iditerod City sprang into 
life with the celerity of the usual mining town. The 
buildings were mostly frame instead of log as there is 
little timber in this part of the country. As has been the 
case with most of the mining towns of Alaska, a fire 
destroyed the little place shortly after it was built. But 
with customary Alaskan spirit, it was quickly rebuilt, and 
to-day though small still maintains its existence in this 
little frequented part of Alaska. 

Iditerod and the towns near it are reached in summer 
by boats up the Innoko River from the Yukon. The 
country has few attractive features, being low and flat 
in its first approaches from the Yukon. Gradually it 
grows a bit more rolling in character and low mountains 
show on the horizon. The region is, in the main, 
treeless. 

The town was laid out with a little more regularity 
than the usual mining settlement, for its few streets are 
parallel and intersect each other at right angles. The 
buildings are small. Most of the timber for their con- 
struction had to be brought in which made building costly 
and so size was cut to the lowest possible dimension. 

About seven miles from Iditerod is Flat City, another 
small settlement that grew from the discovery of gold 
on Flat Creek. It is much the same as Iditerod in ap- 
pearance and a horse tramway run on wooden rails con- 
nects the two. Dikeman and a few other little mining 
camps are scattered through the section. Some dredges 
have been brought in as the ground scarcely yielded suf- 
ficient returns to make the more primitive methods prof- 



Little Known Regions of Alaska 217 

itable. With cheaper methods of operation, however, 
fair returns could be secured. 

When the survey for the government railroad from 
Cook Inlet northward was made, a party was sent into 
this Kuskokwim region to report on a route through to 
Iditerod and the Yukon with the possibility sometime of 
its going on across the Seward Peninsula to Nome. 
Quite a practicable route was discovered, and no doubt 
in time such a road will be built and this vast region with 
its resources opened to development. At present sup- 
plies can be brought in only through Bering Sea and the 
Yukon, which are open only for a short time in the sum- 
mer, down the Yukon from White Horse, down the 
Xanana from Fairbanks, or else over a winter trail 
through the Alaska range. All these routes are round- 
about and costly. If a direct service could be had 
through Seward, an ocean port open the year round, and 
then by rail, this section would soon show a vast change. 



CHAPTER XVI 
SITKA AND Alaska's history 

How TO REACH SiTKA. Its BEAUTIFUL ENVIRONMENT. ThE 
MEETING OF THE OLD AND THE NEW IN THE TOWN. ThE GrEEK 

CHURCH. The Government Experimental Farm. The 
Sheldon Jackson School. Beautiful Lovers' Lane. 

Sitka, a gem of rare scenic beauty and a place about 
which centres much of Alaska's history, is off the regular 
route of travel. Steamers returning to Seattle from 
Cordova and other points to the westward sometimes 
make a stop at Sitka. Some of the boats to Skagway 
from Seattle take the place in, either going or coming. 
But if one wants to make sure of a visit to Sitka, he 
must carefully plan his itinerary to include it. He can- 
not take it for granted that his steamer will stop there. 
It is wisest to make definite inquiries and to be sure he 
is on a steamer that not only usually but on this specific 
trip will make this point. If one intends staying either 
at Juneau or Skagway for a summer holiday, small 
launches can be secured for a special trip and this is one 
of the most delightful ways to go, as many places can be 
visited that could not otherwise be seen. 

The scenery en route to Sitka, whether he comes from 
Cordova or from Juneau or Skagway, is among the most 
magnificent of all the Alaska coast. This is particularly 
true if he comes from the westward. The journey has 
all the beauty of winding waterways and wooded shores, 
and, in addition, it has the spectacle of the St. Elias range 
of mountains sweeping up almost from the coast into 

218 



Sitka and Alaska's History 219 

peaks twelve thousand, fourteen thousand and sixteen 
thousand feet high. Clear cut and sharp against the 
blue sky these peaks stand, robed in snow from base to 
summit. Tremendous glaciers wind down their sides, 
for this is the region of the great glaciers of Alaska. It 
is here that Malaspina Glacier sends its great ice wall 
down to the ocean. And when the open waters of the 
Pacijfic are left behind and the steamer threads Icy Strait 
and Cross Sound, Glacier Bay is passed where is Muir 
Glacier, not merely a stream of ice winding down a 
mountain-walled valley like the Swiss glaciers but a 
broad undulating prairie of ice. Some of its tributaries 
alone are from ten to twenty miles long and two to six 
miles wide. The largest of the Swiss glaciers is only 
sixteen miles long and about a mile wide, so that the 
magnitude of this sheet of ice in comparison can be 
imagined. There are two hundred tributaries large and 
small of the Muir Glacier, and it is estimated that it 
probably contains as much ice as all the eleven hundred 
Swiss glaciers combined. Neither this nor the Mala- 
spina Glacier can be seen from the steamers but they can 
be visited in small launches, which is why these special 
trips are so unusually delightful. 

Icy Strait is itself a glorious scene. Blue waters 
stretch to shore lines of low, green hills and then above 
these tower the great mountains, peak after peak in the 
sublime beauty of majestic height and purity, a mighty 
host and as spotlessly white as if painted. The name 
was given because of the ice that breaks off from Muir 
Glacier and floats out to sea here. 

All the names hereabouts are interesting either because 
of their fitness or by reason of their historic interest. 
Cross Sound, which adjoins Icy Strait, was so named by 
Captain Cook because it was discovered on the third of 



220 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

May which is marked on the calendars as the " Finding 
of the Cross." 

As Sitka is approached the scenery grows more beau- 
tiful. Every nook and corner has its charm. A small 
cove into which the steamer turned for a stop at a salmon 
cannery was a scene of unusual loveliness. From one 
end of the boat the water, green as jade, stretched to a 
curving beach, beyond which lay dense spruce forests. 
Over the tops of the spruce trees rose a cone-shaped 
mountain and beyond a great snow range. From the 
other end of the boat the water swept away blue as tur- 
quoise to distant green hills and beyond these again 
towered snow mountains. At the water's edge wherever 
a foot of soil permitted were masses of rosy fireweed. 

Amid such scenes of beauty the steamer winds its way 
through narrow channels with tiny buoys surmounted 
with little red caps to mark the route. Point after point 
reaches out as if trying to block the passage, but the 
steamer slips around them and at last Sitka Harbor itself 
is reached. The water here is dotted with innumerable 
islands crowded with green, slender-tipped spruce. The 
shore line beyond curves in a delicate crescent and behind 
the little cluster of houses and the green trees rise snow 
capped peaks, among them Mt. Edgecumbe. 

The town itself is an interesting and vivid contrast of 
the old and the new. On one hand are the most modern 
of canneries with all the quick, deft machinery for clean- 
ing and packing and sealing its products in the most 
efficient manner. In contrast are old monastery build- 
ings, crumbling log houses and totem poles telling of the 
myths of a primitive people. One sees in the Indian 
village natives still living the life of primitive times. 
And at the other end of the town in the fine school estab- 
lished by the Presbyterian Mission Board are happy. 



Sitka and Alaska's History 221 

clean, bright-eyed Indians in the garb of civiHzation 
making furniture, cultivating gardens, busy in all the 
occupations of the progressive world of to-day. 

The town though it has little regularity of streets does 
not have the jumbled, disorderly appearance of many 
Alaskan towns thus laid out. The streets wind in pleas- 
ant curves along the shore front or back over the hills. 
The houses are placed where it best suited their owners. 
But there is no sense of crowding and there is a charm 
of greenness and neatness that leaves a refreshing mem- 
ory as if life is lived here graciously and leisurely. 

Sitka has several places of keen interest for the visitor. 
Perhaps the one that calls most loudly is the Greek church 
whose golden cross and green dome stand out above the 
other buildings. 

A caretaker shows tourists about, a pleasant, low-voiced 
man of few words who displays a restrained but pardon- 
able pride in the relics and a certain tinge of scorn for 
the irreverent curiosity of the sightseers. 

The church inside though crude in construction is 
rich in color. One can easily imagine the joy the splen- 
dor-loving Russians must have felt to step from the 
green wilderness outside into this scene of richness red- 
olent with its memories of their native land. 

The walls are decorated with many oil paintings of 
the Annunciation, of saints, of ancient Bible characters, 
of angels and archangels, all rich and soft in coloring 
and well executed. Many of these paintings are more 
than a hundred years old. Some are believed to be more 
than two hundred. 

The altar stretching across one end of the church is 
rich with gold and silver and the soft glow of lovely 
colors in canvases of the Madonna and Child, St. Michael, 
the Angel Gabriel, the Last Supper and similar subjects. 



222 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Many of these are overlaid with gold or silver. Some 
are of carved ivory overlaid with gold, some are of hand- 
hammered silver. Tall candlesticks richly decorated in 
colors or with fine beadwork, superb banners, a mass of 
rich embroidery, add to the sumptuous effect. It is a 
feast of color, of good paintings and fine handwork that 
one does not expect to find in this out of the way corner 
of the world. 

One painting in particular arrests the eye, a canvas of 
the Madonna and Child. The sweetness of expression, 
the delicacy and softness of coloring, linger long in mem- 
ory. Some artist has put his soul into this canvas, and 
though his name is forgotten, his work endures as a 
lovely picture of the ideal. Mr. Pierpont Morgan of- 
fered $25,000 for it, so desirous was he of adding it to 
his collection. But the Russians love their church and 
all it contains. Money is no temptation to them. 

There are handsome chalice cloths richly embroidered 
in gold and silver and in colored silks in quaint, little- 
known designs, or in rich, intricate beadwork. There 
are priests' robes stiff with their gold and silver embroid- 
ery, and marriage crowns and bishops' mitres glittering 
with jewels. When the visitor comes out of the church 
and sees the grass-grown streets of the quiet little town, 
the sagging, moss-covered roof of the old log trading 
post, the steamer at the dock, the cannery humming with 
its modern machinery, he feels as if he has been far away 
from this scene, glimpsing the religious longings and the 
artistic expression of a distant people and another time. 

As has been said, Sitka is a place of contrasts. As 
one leaves the church and wanders on up the street, a 
neatly lettered sign directs to the government experimen- 
tal farm whose neat buildings and thrifty-looking fields 
can be glimpsed through the trees. Sitka is the head- 




MADONNA AND CHILD," IN THE GREEK CHURCH, SITKA 



Sitka and Alaska's History 223 

quarters for the experimental work the United States is 
doing in agricultural ways for Alaska. The chief of the 
bureau has his home here and several acres of ground 
are under cultivation. 

The Old Pioneers' Home is at Sitka where Alaska's 
pioneers are cared for by the Territorial government. 
The first Alaska legislature enacted a law for the estab- 
Hshment of this home for aged prospectors and those 
who have spent their years in Alaska assisting in opening 
and developing the Territory and who have become in- 
capacitated for further physical labor and are dependent. 

The buildings are pleasantly situated facing the har- 
bor and were those formerly occupied by the United 
States Marine Corps. Many improvements and addi- 
tions have been made including a hospital and cottages 
for the isolation of contagious cases. A physician and a 
corps of trained nurses are employed. The management 
and control of the Home are vested in a board of trustees 
consisting of the Governor of the Territory and two citi- 
zens appointed by him. 

Another place of interest is the Sheldon Jackson School 
for Indians. At one end of the town is the Indian vil- 
lage, at the other end, the school; and if any one wanted 
proof of the value of such work for the natives the con- 
trast between these two places would give it. The village 
is better in many respects than some Indian settlements, 
but even so, the contrast between the Indians here and the 
happy, clean, neatly dressed natives at the school is 
marked. 

The school is the outgrowth of the Presbyterian mis- 
sion work in Alaska. It was first known as the Sitka 
Mission School, but in 1911, upon the completion of the 
new school plant, the name of the Sheldon Jackson School 
was decided upon in honor of the pioneer explorer, edu- 



224 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

cator and missionary. A mammoth rock on the shore 
at the approach to the grounds bears a bronze tablet upon 
which is inscribed, 

Sheldon Jackson School 

Dedicated to the memory of Sheldon Jackson 

1834—1909 

Pioneer missionary, explorer and educator in the 

Rocky Mountains and Alaska 

"And in every work that he began, he did it with all his 

heart." 11. Chronicles, 31:21. 

The school buildings are pleasantly situated in a little 
amphitheatre of green grass hemmed in by the woods 
and with the island-dotted harbor in front. They are 
mostly simple, brown-shingled structures that fit restfully 
into their environment and include dormitories, cottages, 
residences for the teaching corps, a steam laundry, print- 
ing shop and other industrial buildings and a museum. 
There is a modernly equipped gymnasium with shower 
baths and lockers. The pupils make many articles of 
furniture used on the premises, do beautiful work in 
brass and copper, and in their printing plant do much of 
the commercial work needed by the residents of Sitka. 

Aside from its interest as part of the school, the 
museum is in itself a noteworthy contribution to the 
attractions of Sitka. Here are collected many things 
that have to do with the early Russian occupancy of 
Alaska as well as curios of Indian life and legend. A 
small pipe organ is here that was brought from Russia 
in the early days ; Russian trading beads made in Bohemia 
by hand especially for bartering with the Indians; and 
two dainty, miniature-like cuff buttons, picked up in an 
old Russian house to the westward. One tries to con- 



Sitka and Alaska's History 225 

jecture what the persons whose sweet faces are here por- 
trayed thought of the new hfe and country to which they 
had come, or decides perhaps that these pictures are por- 
traits of dear ones left behind. Russian bricks, copper 
tea kettles, shears from St. Michael with great, curving 
handles, a picture of the famous Russian missionary 
Veniaminof, bells cast in Alaskan foundries, all these 
things and many more give a kaleidoscopic picture of the 
life that throbbed so busily on these northern shores a 
hundred years and more ago. 

The museum is even more liberally supplied with me- 
morials of Indian life. There are the quaintly decorated 
wooden chests which lovers of Indian handiwork always 
so desire to possess, fine specimens of Chilkat blankets, 
masks used in war and potlatch dances, belts made of 
caribou teeth. There is a ladder fashioned by cutting 
steps in the trunk of a tree, and an anchor composed of 
a heavy stone with one end fitted with a crude wood 
casing to which a rope could be attached, and other 
articles showing the ingenuity of these primitive people. 
One can read many pages of early Alaska history and 
life in this museum which owes its inspiration to Mr. 
Jackson, who let no opportunity slip by to gather any 
material that spoke of early times. 

Many other parts of the town have their interest. 
Streets with Russian names, Matsoutoff, Baranof, Pes- 
chouroff, and then with the sharp contrast with which 
the place is full, Lincoln Avenue, wander off in whimsical 
fashion and tempt to exploration. The Russian grave- 
yard, the old log trading post, the roof sagging, the walls 
losing their staunch uprightness, the old Russian monas- 
tery or mission house where the Russian priest lives, 
though as the Russian church no longer has a head the 
officials do not know just what is their standing, all fire 



226 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

the imagination with pictures of another hfe and another 
world from that of to-day. But though all these have 
their distinct charm, to many the most beautiful and 
most enjoyable part of a visit to Sitka is the walk through 
the Indian Park, or the Indian Walk, or Lovers' Lane, 
as it is variously called. 

Indian Park in which is this famous walk lies beyond 
the Sheldon Jackson School and past a few frame houses 
in which some of the graduates of the school live. The 
road to it winds along the curving shore with the blue 
waters of the harbor, the green islands with a tiny line 
of white surf beating against the gray rocks at their base, 
making a picture of lovely color and gentle line for the 
eyes to feast upon. Then suddenly the path plunges 
into a dense, cool, evergreen forest with thick moss be- 
neath the feet and ferns and ground dogwood making a 
carpet of green between the tall, straight tree trunks as 
far as the eye can see. The sunlight penetrates fitfully 
here and there, lighting the green-brown gloom with flick- 
ering spots of gold or sending down some dark avenue a 
shaft in which tiny motes dance. Not a sound is heard 
but the gentle splashing of the waves on the near-by 
shore or the song of a bird. Then through the trees is 
caught a gleam of color and a gigantic totem pole looms 
up, a strange, barbaric note amidst this simple beauty of 
nature. Then another and another appears, grim, weird, 
and then off in a little grassy glade among the trees is 
quite a group of them. But soon they are left behind, 
the path sweeps out to a point on the shore and then 
turns to the left and follows the clear, brownish water 
of Indian River that flows in shallow ripples over stones 
and gravel into the sea. Then it swings back under a 
green archway to the shore with an entrancing vista 
ahead through an avenue of dark green boughs of the 



Sitka and Alaska's History 227 

harbor with one tiny island crowded to its edge with fir 
trees set right in the centre of the picture, as if the 
pathway had been chosen, perhaps it was, because of this 
charming picture that fills the vista at the end. 

As one comes out of the woods a very fine view of the 
town itself is obtained clustered on the beach with the 
foreign-looking green dome and gold cross of the Greek 
church dominating it, and the mountains rising beyond. 



CHAPTER XVII 

Alaska's romantic history^ 

Vitus Bering and other early explorers. The various 
Russian fur companies. Baranof and his work. The 
purchase by the United States. Boundary questions. 

At Sitka one comes in contact more comprehensively 
and more closely than elsewhere w^ith the history of 
Alaska. This town was the principal city of the Russian 
occupation, here Baranof, the builder of the Czar's do- 
main in America, had for many years his official resi- 
dence, and here after the transfer to the United States 
the capital of the Territory was established. As Alaskan 
history begins thus to unroll here many are sur- 
prised to find that it consists of more than annals of gold 
stampeders, that it reaches back into other centuries and 
other civilizations, and that it matches in picturesque 
quality that of New England and its Puritans, Pennsyl- 
vania and its Quakers, Florida and its Spaniards, Louisi- 
ana and its Creoles, and California and its missions. 

Alaskan history begins, one might say, in Siberia with 
a little venturesome band of Cossacks who had crossed 
the Ural Mountains, crossed Siberia, reached Bering Sea, 
though it was not then so called, and there heard tales of 
a great land to the eastward. These tales were verified 
by the timber that washed up on the shore and the birds 
that flew over the water, for these were different from 
those of the country in which they then were. 

These tales of a country beyond and the conjectures as 
to what it must be like drifted back with many additions 

228 



Alaska's Romantic History 229 

to St. Petersburg and here found an attentive listener in 
the alert, astute Peter the Great. Why not a Russia 
in America as well as a Russia in Asia and a Russia in 
Europe, he ambitiously dreamed? To make the dream 
come true, he immediately set about sending out expedi- 
tions to explore. 

The one which resulted in the discovery of the Ameri- 
can coast was in charge of Vitus Bering, a Dane, who had 
been in the Russian naval service for some thirty years. 
With him was associated Alexei Chirikof as heutenant. 
Before this expedition finally sailed from the Kamchatkan 
coast, Peter the Great passed away, but his wishes were 
faithfully carried out by the Empress Catherine, his 
widow, and Elizabeth, his daughter. The expedition com- 
prised not only Bering and Chirikof and the necessary 
crew, but several scientific men, among them being George 
Wilhelm Steller, the naturalist, whose investigations 
added much to the early knowledge of Alaska's natural 
history. 

Two vessels were fitted out, one commanded by Bering, 
the other in charge of Chirikof. For several days the 
two vessels kept together as well as they could. But a 
violent storm came up, some disagreement or misunder- 
standing arose between Bering and Chirikof as to the 
course to be pursued and the boats became separated. 
Chirikof spent several days trying to find his superior 
officer, but finally decided it was folly to waste further 
time, and as the object of the expedition was to find land, 
he decided to be about it. He shaped his course eastward 
and on the fifteenth of July, 1741, sighted land. It was 
a high wooded mountain, green and beautiful, and a boat 
was sent ashore. But no landing place could be found 
and the party returned. A fog and rain then came on 
and the shore disappeared in the mist. The next day the 



230 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

weather cleared and still higher mountains were sighted 
as well as the entrance to a great bay. 

An exploring party was again sent ashore. Several days 
passed without their return and Chirikof, becoming 
alarmed, sent a second boat. This also failed to come 
back. The next day two canoes filled with Indians ap- 
peared but did not approach the vessel. Chirikof had no 
more ship's boats and his force was already greatly de- 
pleted by the loss of the men sent. He cruised about for 
several days hoping to receive some signal that the men 
were still alive. But finally he gave up all hope and 
turned his vessel toward Kamchatka, 

Land was sighted several times on the way back, high 
mountains covered with snow being frequently seen. He 
had no boats, however, to land. He had, in fact, no means 
of getting fresh water and the party suffered greatly for 
the lack of it. Sickness broke out, Chirikof himself fall- 
ing ill. A number of the expedition died. The sails 
rotted and fell to pieces, for the crew, few in number and 
feeble from sickness, were unable to take proper care of 
the vessel. The ship almost navigated itself. But finally 
the party reached Kamchatka, more than a score of the 
little company having been lost and almost all of those 
who did return being ill. 

Bering's voyage was far more disastrous. When the 
two vessels were separated, he drifted about for a day 
hoping to find Chirikof, but finally gave up the attempt 
and headed southward. Finding nothing, he changed his 
course eastward and then northeastward. The records 
of his voyage show constant changes, as if he were unde- 
cided just what course to adopt. For five weeks he thus 
drifted about. Water became short and the crew were 
rationed on it. At last, however, on July 16th, a towering 
peak and a great chain of snow mountains were seen. A 



Alaska's Romantic History 231 

contrary wind held them off from the coast until July 20, 
when they were enabled to land on an island, which was 
named St, Elias in honor of the day. 

Two boats were sent ashore in one of which was Stel- 
ler, the naturalist. Huts of log and rough planks roofed 
with bark and dried grass were found, also copper instru- 
ments, a whetstone, a rattle made of clay, broken arrows, 
some dried fish, ropes made of seaweed, and some cooking 
utensils. Steller gathered some plants among which was 
the forget-me-not, which to-day is the Territorial flower. 
Steller was loath to leave without further study of the 
natural resources of the new land, but Bering ordered him 
aboard. One can imagine the scientist's joy and enthu- 
siasm at being the first to explore this new land and his 
regret at having so short a time in which to make obser- 
vations. In his " Journal," he says of this first landing, 
" On descending the mountain covered with a vast forest 
without any trace of road or trail, I found it impossible 
to make my way through the thicket, and consequently 
re-ascended; looking mournfully at the limits of my ob- 
servations, I turned my eyes toward the continent which 
it was not in my power to explore. Again receiving a 
positive order to join to the ship I returned mournfully 
with my collection." He is described by others of the 
party when Bering ordered him to come back as being 
perched on a steep rock taking in as much as possible of 
America. 

For some unaccountable reason Bering would not take 
on a sufficient quantity of water, but having found the 
land of which they had come in search, he ordered a 
return to Asia. The other officers called his attention to 
the unfilled water casks but he was deaf to their sugges- 
tions. He wanted to go home and he went. 

A course was shaped south and west. Land was sighted 



232 Alaska, Ouj Beautiful Northland 

through fog at various times, but no landing was made. 
It was thought that at one time the coast of what is now 
Kodiak was seen. Progress was made through numerous 
islands which were, no doubt, the islands off Kodiak, the 
Alaska Peninsula and the beginning of the Aleutians. 
Water gave out and sickness broke out among the crew. 
One died and was buried on the Shumagin Islands, the 
name being given in his memory. 

Bering himself fell ill. Sickness among the crew in- 
creased. Every day saw a death on board until there 
were scarcely enough of the crew left to manage the 
ship. Of this period Steller says in his " Journal," " The 
most eloquent pen would fail to describe the misery of 
our condition." Bering, it is said, was profuse in his 
promises to celestial powers. Catholic or Protestant, 
Greek or German, he guaranteed plentiful donations to 
all alike if any would help him. He was not particular as 
to creed so only he received the help desired. 

The condition of the ship was terrible. The crew, no 
matter how ill, were compelled to work night and day in 
rain, cold and snow, for the season was late and winter 
was setting in. The sails and rigging were so rotten it 
was impossible to set much canvas. Finally land that 
was believed to be Kamchatka was sighted. Steller gives 
a graphic picture of the effect of it upon all of them. " It 
would be impossible to describe the joy created by the 
sight of land," he writes. " The dying crawled on deck 
to see with their own eyes what they could not believe; 
even the feeble commander was carried out of his cabin. 
To the astonishment of all, a small keg of brandy was 
taken from some hiding place and dealt out in celebration 
of the supposed approach to the coast of Kamchatka." 

The next day, however, an accident befell the boat that 
made a landing on the nearest land imperative. They 



Alaska's Romantic History 233 

steered, therefore, toward the point immediately at hand 
and cast anchor. But the sea began to rise, the anchor 
cable broke, a huge wave carried the boat over a ledge of 
rocks, and they were held fast in a little bay on a shore of 
which they knew nothing. 

They set about making themselves as comfortable as 
possible. There was a little driftwood on the island and 
by digging caves in the sand and shielding them with what 
sail-cloth they had left, they made some sort of shelters. 
The sick people were then carried ashore. The only 
animals seen were Arctic foxes, who fell upon the dead 
and devoured them before burial was possible. The sea 
otter was found for food, and it was this discovery of 
the animal, it is said, that led eventually to the founding 
of the Russian power in America. 

Winter set in, sickness increased, food was scarce, and 
dull despair settled upon all in the little community. At 
last on a cold, gray day in December, Bering died in a 
miserable hut half covered with sand which trickled in on 
him. A few days afterward, the second mate died and 
then more of the sailors. It began to look as if the whole 
little band would be wiped out. But finally the sick ones 
began to improve, the outlook grew brighter, and thought 
was turned to means of leaving this barren waste. 

The castaways in their explorations had already dis- 
covered that they were on an island and not on the coast 
of Kamchatka as they had believed. They saw that if 
they were ever to get away they must take matters in 
their own hands. Finally it was decided to use what re- 
mained of the ship to build a boat. Even then in their 
desperate condition so great was their awe of their rulers 
that they feared they would be punished for taking a gov- 
ernment vessel to pieces. But they decided it would be no 
worse than death on the island and so they began. 



234 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

It was not until the middle of the following summer 
that the vessel was completed. All the provisions they 
had for it was the meat of sea animals. But crudely built 
and poorly provisioned as it was, they set forth in it, not 
knowing where they were nor how to reach the coast they 
were seeking. But finally they came to Kamchatka. 

Thus, in disaster, ended the two voyages which had set 
out with such high hopes to discover America. But they 
had succeeded in their object. The land to the eastward 
was proven to exist, and the skins of the sea otters which 
these survivors brought back gave it a value that imme- 
diately turned covetous eyes toward it. Although upon 
Bering's and Chirikof's discoveries Russia based her 
claim to the ownership of northwest America, probably 
little further would have been done for many years at 
least, if these rich and valuable furs had not pointed to a 
new source of wealth. In Russia, fur was almost the 
currency of the country. Taxes and salaries were paid 
in furs. In old charters and legal documents, penalties 
and rewards were given in furs. The sea otter was es- 
pecially valuable, so that the discovery was to the Rus- 
sians what the finding of gold in Alaska was to later 
generations. Hardship, toil, even death, were braved to 
share in this new source of wealth. 

Within a few years a horde of traders and hunters had 
started for these new lands. Although little was known 
in regard to the region and there were no charts to guide 
through these unknown waters, these men were not de- 
terred. The boats they built were of the crudest kind 
and often went to pieces in the first gale, but though there 
were shipwrecks and much sufifering, the rich cargoes 
they brought back of sea otter and fox skins incited others 
to brave the dangers. The gentle, peaceful natives of 
these islands, the Aleutians, were cruelly mistreated. It 



Alaska's Romantic History 235 

is said many committed suicide to escape from the Rus- 
sians, and for a hundred years and more the cruelties of 
these early traders were told by the remnant of the race 
that were happy and prosperous until the Russians ar- 
rived. It has been estimated that the natives, who num- 
bered about twenty-five thousand at the coming of the 
Russians, were reduced to less than a thousand under the 
Russian rule. 

The outrages committed by these early traders led to 
the formation of trading companies with the pretense at 
least of government oversight. The most important of 
these was the one with which Grigor Shelikof was asso- 
ciated. He has been called the founder of the Russian 
colonies on the American continent. He banded these 
various traders into companies, started colonies and 
brought order, system and efficiency into the business. 

With Shelikof at the head of affairs, operations were 
extended eastward. The ruthless slaughter of the fur- 
bearing animals on the islands first discovered was be- 
ginning to show in decreased returns. If the business was 
to continue to be profitable new hunting grounds were 
necessary. Foreseeing this, Shelikof sent expeditions to 
the mouth of the Copper River, which was ascended for 
some distance, and to Prince William Sound, which was 
at that time named by the Russians, Chugach. This name 
is still retained by the mountains near the coast but the 
name of the body of water was changed by Captain Cook 
to Prince William Sound. 

Not only did he decide that new hunting grounds were 
necessary but that the establishment of permanent col- 
onies would be wise. Therefore, in 1783, three vessels 
were fitted out, a company of about two hundred people 
gathered, and with his wife, who always accompanied him 
on his expeditions, he sailed eastward, finally reaching 



236 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Kikhtak or Kaniag, the present Kodiak, and entered a 
harbor named after their vessels, Three Saints. Here 
they made a settlement, though the natives at first at- 
tacked them and tried to prevent them from occupying 
the land. Houses and fortifications were erected, Sheli- 
kof making his own residence as luxurious as possible in 
order, it is said, to impress the savages. A school was 
opened, Shelikof himself teaching and also Madame 
Shelikof. Gardens were planted, and the little settlement 
took on signs of permanency. Explorations were made 
on near-by islands and coasts and further colonies 
planned. 

In 1786 one of the companies with which Shelikof was 
connected sent out Gerassim Pribylof who discovered the 
fur seal islands. Here were also found sea otters, for 
they had not been disturbed in this section, and also walrus 
and fox, and these new sources of valuable furs and other 
products brought in a new harvest of wealth. 

Affairs were now going well with Shelikof and he 
returned to Siberia to take steps for obtaining the ex- 
clusive right to trade in these regions for his companies. 

The Russians, however, had not been left in undis- 
puted possession of these waters. The news of the rich 
harvest they were reaping had reached the ears of other 
governments and other traders, and various expeditions 
had been sent to explore and to take possession of the land 
in the name of their respective sovereigns, and many pri- 
vate traders of other nationalities had also come. 

The Spanish had arrived in 1773, and for some twenty 
years and more thereafter they went through the cere- 
mony at various places of claiming the land for Spain. 
Mt. Edgecumbe was discovered by the Spanish and named 
Mt. San Jacinto. At one time they had quite a flourishing 
colony for a few years at Nootka on the western coast of 



Alaska's Romantic History 237 

Vancouver Island. The natives were driven off the land 
and a little Spanish village established with a fort 
mounted with cannon, barracks, cottages, storehouses, a 
church, hospital, bakery, blacksmith and carpenter shops. 
The ceremony of taking possession was full of the color 
and picturesqueness of Spain. Flags were raised and 
cannon fired. There was speechmaking and feasting. 
Meanwhile, from vantage points on near-by hills, the In- 
dians sadly watched the occupation of their pleasant land, 
and could they have fully understood the activities of 
these strangers the irony of blandly appropriating the 
property of others and then erecting thereon a house in 
which to worship a God of justice, must have sunk deep 
into their savage breasts. 

The Indians, however, were helpless, and the little 
Spanish settlement flourished. Gardens were planted, 
vegetables raised and life was quite comfortable and 
happy. Vancouver says of it, " Their poultry, consisting 
of fowls and turkeys, were in excellent condition and in 
abundance, as were black cattle and swine." The captain 
of a trading vessel from Boston also reports the settle- 
ment's prosperity and tells of a dinner he had there at 
which everything was served on silver and that when he 
sailed away forty fresh salmon, fresh pork, eggs, butter, 
new bread, wine, salad and cabbage were given him. 

Alejandro Malaspina, who was in charge of one of 
these Spanish expeditions, entered the bay where is the 
great glacier that bears his name. To this harbor he gave 
the name of Disenchantment Bay because when he first 
entered he thought he had found the long sought passage 
to Hudson Bay. 

The English came, and under Captain Cook and George 
Vancouver made exhaustive and careful explorations and 
surveys. But they were chiefly hunting the route to the 



238 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Atlantic Ocean that it was hoped would be found along 
this coast and they gave little thought to colonization or 
fur hunting. Cook's instructions read, " Make a thorough 
search for a navigable passage into Hudson or Baffin 
Bay." But he was also told " to take possession with 
the consent of the natives in the name of the King of 
Great Britain of certain situations in any such countries 
as you may discover." He went up and down the coast 
carefully sounding and making charts. Cook Inlet, 
which was named for him, he felt sure was the longed-for 
passage and Turnagain Arm aptly expresses his feelings 
as he found he must seek further. He entered Bering 
Sea and went as far north as Icy Cape. Vancouver, who 
had been a midshipman under Cook, continued the work 
after Cook's death, and so careful and accurate was he 
that his charts are in use to-day and his work has been the 
basis of all work since then. He definitely removed all 
doubt as to the possibility of finding any water communi- 
cation for shipping between the north Pacific and the 
interior of the continent. 

The French also came, and in 1786 a French vessel, 
under La Perouse, sighted Mt. St. Elias and Cape Fair- 
weather and made various explorations near by. 

The Russians, however, went steadily ahead with their 
colonization and fur hunting, and under the vigorous 
direction of Shelikof prospered. In 1778 he was suc- 
cessful in securing the imperial favor he had been seeking 
for his enterprise. A ukase was issued granting to the 
Shelikof Company exclusive control over the region occu- 
pied by them. The Empress said in her ukase, " As a re- 
ward for services rendered to the country by the 
merchants Shelikof and Golikof by discovering unknown 
countries and nations and establishing commerce and in- 
dustries there." 



Alaska's Romantic History 239 

His ambitions thus far realized, Shelikof looked about 
him for a man to send to this new country, one who would 
vigorously push the business and be able to handle suc- 
cessfully the many intricate problems that would arise. 
He knew he must have a man of good practical business 
ability, yet one with vision ; firm enough to deal with the 
natives and colonists, yet not so brutal as to fail to win 
their cooperation; a man, too, who was trustworthy, for 
all the multiple business of the company would be in his 
hands. His choice fell upon Alexander Baranof. Bara- 
nof at first declined, but his own affairs not prospering, 
he finally accepted and thus came upon the scene, the 
second man to help make the Russian colonization of this 
part of America a success. 

Baranof was born in eastern Russia and early went to 
Moscow where he became a clerk in a retail establishment. 
Later he emigrated to Siberia where he eventually went 
into the trading business for himself. Shelikof in some of 
his journeys through Siberia had no doubt met him and 
been impressed with his ability. 

The task that confronted the new manager was not 
light. The traders that were coming into these waters 
for sea otter skins, which were the very life of the Sheli- 
kof Company, had better and fresher goods than the 
Russians could bring by sled across Siberia and did not 
have to maintain permanent forts and settlements and so 
could be more lavish with their goods. Not only did he 
have this handicap to fight, but at the time he took charge, 
dissatisfaction was rife among the Shelikof employees. 
No supply ships had arrived from Russia for several years 
and the traders and hunters for the Russians had been 
compelled to live on the native food and they were almost 
on the point of mutiny. 

But he quickly grasped the situation and began laying 



240 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

plans to put the work he had undertaken on a broad and 
sure foundation. 

He overcame the handicap of fresher and better goods 
in the hands of his rivals by trading for these goods the 
sealskins w^hich the English traders could not get, and 
then with the goods thus secured, he bought the sea otter 
skins and thus prevented his rivals from getting them. 

He settled the question of more certain and more reg- 
ular supplies by deciding to build ships. He chose what 
is now known as Resurrection Bay as the site for his ship- 
building venture and soon the mountains of Kenai Penin- 
sula resounded with the sound of the axe and the crash of 
falling trees. Many needed materials of course were 
lacking but he did not despair. Iron was collected from 
the pieces of wrecks. Steel for axes was prepared from 
the same material. In regard to the difficulties of the 
work he wrote a friend, " We have only half a keg of 
tar, three kegs of pitch, not a pound of oakum, not a single 
nail and very little iron for so large a vessel." But Bara- 
nof was a resourceful man and in 1794 the first ship 
built on the Pacific coast was launched. The vessel was 
of spruce timber, seventy-three feet in length, with three 
masts. The calking above the water line was done with 
moss, and for paint, tar and whale oil was used. The 
sails consisted of pieces and scraps of canvas. The result 
was a number of sheets of different qualities and colors. 
The strangely compounded paint was unequal in color and 
gave the hull a spotted appearance. 

But poorly built and uncouth looking as it was, it dem- 
onstrated that ships could be constructed here and marked 
a decided step forward in the affairs of the company. 
Work was at once commenced on other vessels and Bara- 
nof began laying plans for more extended trading and 
colonization operations. 



Alaska's Romantic History 241 

At this opportune time the merging of the Shehkof 
Company with other independent companies and eventu- 
ally the establishment of the Russian-American Company 
gave him the support needed for these plans and helped 
to the realization of two of his great ambitions, the in- 
corporation with Russia of the whole of northwestern 
America and the prevention of other nations from estab- 
lishing a trade with the natives. 

To carry out these purposes he decided to locate a 
permanent settlement in the vicinity of Norfolk Sound 
where Sitka now is. The first settlement here was at- 
tacked by natives and practically wiped out, but the second 
colony was rhore successful, and in 1804, Sitka, or Novo 
Arkhangelsk as it was then called, was established after a 
fight in which the natives were disposed of. A residence 
for Baranof, barracks, a fort with a stockade, and other 
buildings were erected. A flour mill, a sawmill, a tan- 
nery, a shop for repairing nautical instruments, cooper 
and smith shops, a foundry, a shipbuilding plant, were 
from time to time started and the little colony became a 
busy place. Spades and plowshares were manufactured 
and the bells used in some of the missions in California 
were cast here. Vegetable gardens were also planted and 
cattle raised. 

Though Baranof was growing old he did not stop with 
the advance to Sitka. He reached out for trade with Cali- 
fornia and even founded a colony there and turned his 
eyes to the Sandwich Islands and endeavored to extend 
the business of his company there. But as the years crept 
on he finally asked to be relieved and though his request 
was disregarded for a long time, it was at last granted 
and a successor was appointed. 

The record of his long service was one of absolute 
honesty and this at a time and among a people not noted 



242 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

for this trait. But in all the complicated accounts of the 
vast enterprise not a discrepancy was to be found and cash 
accounts involving millions were in perfect order. He 
seems to have been ambitious for the company rather than 
desirous of furthering his own interests in any way. 

In appearance he is described as below the medium 
height, thin and sallow in complexion and with scanty, 
red-tinged, flaxen hair, fringing a bald crown. In later 
years he wore a black wig tied to his head with a black 
handkerchief. When seventy, life and energy sparkled 
in his eyes. He was abstemious in his eating, for he rose 
early and ate but one meal a day, but he was said to be a 
hard drinker and the feasts he gave which ended usually in 
a state of intoxication for all present are matters of rec- 
ord. But it must be remembered that in those days drink- 
ing, and especially with the Russians, was a customary 
matter. 

He was said to have a furious temper but he was ex- 
tremely gentle with his daughter and was wax in her 
hands. He was most particular as to her training, and 
once upon discovering the governess whom he had em- 
ployed to educate this daughter, drinking, he drove the 
woman from the house. At the banquets he gave at 
which there was much music and singing, as well as feast- 
ing and drinking, he always sent his daughter away as 
soon as he began to feel the effects of his potations. 

The long years in this new country, many of them filled 
with hardships of the most extreme kind, no doubt did 
much to make him rough and uncouth and to cause him 
to find his pleasures in the gratification of appetites. But 
these faults, which undoubtedly grew in a large measure 
from his environment, were insignificant in comparison 
with the work accomplished. In summing up his achieve- 
ments an historian says of him, " He was the moving 



Alaska's Romantic History 243 

and directing spirit of Russian America. When he came 
to the colony he found a post at Three Saints built of 
■alder and plastered with clay and the sub-stations ex- 
tended only to Kodiak and Cook Inlet. He left an em- 
pire in extent whose outposts were at Ross, California, on 
the Pribilof Islands, and the Kurile Islands. He built 
churches and established schools. Ten vessels were con- 
structed under his management in the territory and four 
others at Ross. He introduced cattle at Kodiak, Una- 
laska, Unga, Sitka and Ross. There were five hundred 
head of cattle at Kodiak during his time. He extended his 
trade to California, to China and to the Sandwich Islands. 
The Russian possessions in the new world attained their 
widest extent under the direction of Baranof." 

He died April 16, 1819, on his way home, and was 
buried at sea. 

Naval officers took Baranof's place, men who had not 
grown up with the enterprise as had Baranof and who 
knew little of the practical work to be done. Behind them 
were officers and directors in Russia who knew nothing 
of the conditions in Alaska. It was government from a 
distance with inexperienced and often indifferent people 
in charge of the immediate work. As a consequence busi- 
ness suffered and profits fell off. Boundary troubles, too, 
arose. When the company's charter had been renewed 
in 1821, the jurisdiction of the company was established 
over all the territory from the northern cape of Van- 
couver Island to Bering Strait and beyond and to all 
islands of that coast as well as those between it and 
Siberia. Thus Russia by ukase took possession of this 
vast territory. The Spanish and French had practically 
withdrawn all claims, but the British, through the Hudson 
Bay and other companies, had posts, if not actually within 
the territory claimed by the Russians, at least on its out- 



244 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

skirts, and both British and American vessels were trad- 
ing in Russian waters. In regard to these latter Russia 
made certain stringent regulations that raised a storm of 
protest and led in 1822-23-25 to a voluminous diplomatic 
correspondence and finally to a convention in which the 
boundary was fixed and certain concessions made. It was 
in regard to this dispute that in a message to Congress in 
1823, President Monroe first gave formal promulgation 
to what has become known as the Monroe Doctrine, so 
Alaska may be said to have been the inspiration of Amer- 
ica for Americans. In this message in referring to the 
boundary dispute in the Northwest at issue between Rus- 
sia, Great Britain and the United States, and the attempt 
made by Russia to exclude foreigners from commerce and 
fishing in the disputed waters, President Monroe said : 
" The occasion has been judged proper for asserting as a 
principle in which the rights and interests of the United 
States are involved that the American continents by the 
free and independent conditions which they have assumed 
and maintained are henceforth not to be considered as 
subject for future colonization by any European Power." 
Various governors were appointed by Russia from 
time to time, among them being Baron Wrangell, Etolin 
and others, who have left their names either on the history 
or the geography of Alaska. Life at Sitka during these 
years was gay and bright. Captains and officers of the 
various vessels that frequented these waters were enter- 
tained, and there were banquets, balls and many festivi- 
ties. Governor Etolin established a social club furnished 
with reading, billiard, card and supper rooms. The li- 
brary, which had been founded in 1805, contained in 1835 
nearly two thousand volumes and about four hundred 
pamphlets and periodicals. Just recently a handsome oil 
portrait of Peter the Great was found in a pile of rubbish. 



Alaska's Romantic History 245 

All of which shows that this part of the world in these 
years was not the wild, uninhabited region many have 
thought it to be. 

During this period exploration expeditions were sent 
out by the Russians, some of them penetrating to some 
distance into the interior, others making investigations 
along the coast. 

The charter of the company was again renewed in 
1841, and at this time an order was given by the gov- 
ernor that no intoxicating liquors were to be sold in the 
colonies. This was quite a blow to the Russian tempera- 
ment for it had not at that time any prohibition inclina- 
tions. When the order was read to the servants of the 
company it is said that they could not refrain from tears, 
and speaking of these sad times one of the men said, " I 
remember Father Baranof. There was a time when a 
camp kettle was set out brimming full and he would shout, 
' Drink, children ! ' and he would himself join in a merry 
song. But now what times have we! We can do noth- 
ing but work, and when that is done we promenade or 
smoke in the barracks. What a life ! You see, we all have 
to join this temperance society, which is some kind of 
sect, and must pay a beaver skin apiece to join, a big 
price to pay for the privilege of drinking nothing but 
water. One man, who was a German who joined, in a 
few weeks was dead. God knows where he is now. I do 
not think there is much room for Dutchmen in heaven, 
so many Russians go there." 

With the coming of the Crimean War Russia began to 
have doubts as to the wisdom of a domain so far away. 
Later when the time came for the renewal of its charter 
by the Russian Company it refused the terms the govern- 
ment gave. The vast territory was now practically with- 
out oversight. Discussions had already been under way 



246 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

as to the United States taking it and proposals had been 
made it is said as early at 1859. Five million dollars 
were at this time offered for it, though not officially. The 
story is told that a company of citizens applied to Mr. 
Seward to assist them in purchasing Alaska to carry on 
a fish, fur and timber trade, and that he, finding Russia 
willing to sell, secured the territory not for the company 
but for the country. Negotiations were, however, con- 
tinued which culminated in 1867 in the purchase by the 
United States of Russian America for the sum of $7,200,- 
000, the cession to be free and unencumbered by any 
reservation, privileges, franchises, grants or possessions 
by any associated companies whether corporate or incor- 
porate, Russian or other. The treaty was signed at four 
o'clock in the morning of March 30, 1867, and was rati- 
fied in May. 

William H. Seward, Secretary of State at this time, is 
the one to whom the chief credit for the successful com- 
pletion of the negotiations is due, though he was ably 
seconded by the eloquence of Charles Sumner, who made 
an address, now historic, on the subject before Congress. 
It is to Sumner that we owe the adoption of the beautiful 
Indian name, Alaska, for in this memorable speech, he 
said : " Clearly any name borrowed from classical history 
or from individual invention will be little better than a 
misnomer or a nickname unworthy of such an occasion. 
The name should come from the country itself. It should 
be indigenous, aboriginal. Happily such a name exists." 

The formal transfer was made October 18, 1867. The 
Russian Commissioner, Captain Alexei Pestchourof, the 
American Commissioner, General L. H. Rousseau, and a 
company of United States infantry landed at Sitka, 
marched to the governor's residence, which had once been 
Baranof's Castle, and with a brief, simple declaration the 



Alaska's Romantic History 247 

Russian flag was hauled down, the Stars and Stripes run 
up, a few salutes fired and Alaska was an American pos- 
session. 

Since the acquisition of Alaska a few international mat- 
ters have come up from time to time, chiefly with Great 
Britain, for settlement. But they have all been amicably 
arranged. One of the most recent of these was the boun- 
dary question which was settled by an international tri- 
bunal of British and American jurists in London in 1903. 
The dispute involved the interpretation of the words in 
the early treaties of 1825 which in certain phrases were 
decidedly vague, and the determination whether the 
coastal boundary should cross or pass around the heads 
of the fiords of the coast. The boundary as fixed in the 
early Anglo-Russian treaty of 1825 was as some one has 
said, " an ideal and not a physical boundary." It did not 
fit in with geographical facts. All questions in dispute 
were, however, finally satisfactorily settled. 

A commission was later appointed to mark the boun- 
dary line where it runs northward from the coast to tlie 
Arctic Ocean between Alaska and Canada. This was a 
far more arduous matter than deciding the disputed 
points. In speaking of this actual surveying work a mem- 
ber of the Commission said, " The treaty makers laid a 
ruler on a map and said, ' This shall be the dividing line.' 
But marking it in that way and marking that line through 
an unknown wilderness w^ere vastly different." 

The Commission was five years finishing its task and 
this boundary is said to be the straightest of the world's 
surveyed lines. It runs for six hundred miles from the 
St. Elias Mountains to the Arctic Ocean, over great moun- 
tain ranges, glaciers, swift rivers, quicksands, bottomless 
morasses. Wherever that line laid on the map went, the 
Commission had to follow even though it might range 



248 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

over some seemingly inaccessible peak or pass through 
an impossible morass. High summits were crossed, 
raging torrents forded, camps made on glaciers. Every 
obstacle of the wilderness was fought and conquered and 
at last the Arctic reached. 

The line consists of a vista twenty feet wide cut 
through all timber, of monuments set at intervisible 
points not more than four miles apart, and of a detailed 
map of the strip of country two miles each side of the 
boundary. At prominent river crossings and at main 
points of travel, the monuments are sectional shafts five 
feet high of aluminum-bronze, weighing three hundred 
pounds, set in a ton of concrete. At less important 
points, the monuments are three feet high and set in fif- 
teen hundred pounds of concrete. 

The romance of this marking of the boundary is not 
the least interesting of the many unusual and picturesque 
features of Alaska's history. But from the coming of 
Bering and Chirikof to the present day the annals of this 
territory are full of the tragic, the pathetic, the pictu- 
resque, the colorful, the unusual. The more minutely one 
looks into it, the more does the voice of humanity speak 
here in many tones. 



CHAPTER XVIII 



FORESTS AND FLOWERS 



a rich carpet of wild flowers throughout the territory. 
Wild berries in profusion. Some wild vegetables. Dense 
and valuable forests. 

In few things is Alaska more surprising to the person 
who visits it for the first time than in its vegetation. 
Mountains and glaciers and icebergs the traveller expects 
to see. Bear and caribou and moose belong to the country 
quite as naturally. In the general thought, the Alaskan 
stage is set with such scenery. But to find the land a sheet 
of vivid wild flowers, to become entangled in almost trop- 
ical jungles, to see luscious berries hanging in a profusion 
never before known is to come upon the unexpected. If 
told before going that this is what one will find the in- 
formant is apt to be looked upon as qualified for imme- 
diate membership in the Ananias Club. 

But this very delightful surprise is in store for those 
unfamiliar with Alaska in summer. There are areas 
where the ground is blue with lupines, rosy with fireweed 
or a rich tapestry of varied colors from many wild- 
flowers. There are thickets of skunk cabbage and devil's 
club and bushes and ferns and moss that are tropical in 
their luxuriance. The skunk cabbage grows so large that 
its leaves suggest those of the banana plant and the foliage 
of the devil's club is easily more than a foot in width. 
These dense thickets are higher than the top of an auto 
spinning along the roads that wind through them. They 
could not be penetrated without the aid of an axe to chop 

249 



250 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

the way. High over this dense underbrush tower spruce 
and hemlock and cedar, the spruce trees sometimes reach- 
ing a height of one hundred and fifty feet. 

Much dehght is added to the pleasure of travelling in 
Alaska by this profusion of wild blossoms. The beauty 
of the Inland Passage is enhanced by the clumps of bril- 
liant fireweed and other flowers that brighten sunny points 
of land or perch wherever they can get a foothold amidst 
the rocks. When the Yukon steamers stop for wood, the 
grassy meadows are aflame with the flowers of the sea- 
son — great fragrant wild roses perhaps, or jewel-like 
columbine, or dainty bluebells. The roads are lined with 
brilliant borders of fireweed, marguerites, daisies, golden- 
rod. It is a land of lovely color, the air fragrant with 
the breath of the blossoms, the pungent odor of ever- 
greens and fresh with the invigorating coolness of snow 
peaks. 

Because of the abundance of snow-capped mountains 
and glaciers and icebergs many have thought of Alaska 
as a region of little vegetation. But flowers and grasses 
and bushes grow on the glaciers almost at the edge of 
snow peaks and some flowers have even been found on 
the glittering blue icebergs floating serenely on the sap- 
phire waters. The many hours of sunshine and the 
powerful heat of the sun overcome the chill of the ice. 
Its only effect upon the vegetation is to provide moisture. 
Wherever sufficient soil has lodged on the glaciers or 
snow to give vegetation root, it will be found to be grow- 
ing. On the icy banks at the foot of the Childs Glacier is 
a thicket of alders, willow and grasses so dense that it 
shuts off part of the view and tourists complain because 
the railroad does not cut it away. Yet if the soil in which 
this vegetation is growing is examined it is found to be 
a mixture of ice and earth. Some one has said that spring 



JFild Flowers 



Forests and Flowers 251 

comes with a shout in Alaska, and truly it does. It leaps 
joyously and exuberantly to life with the long, warm, 
sunny days, and snow peaks and glaciers and icebergs look 
on approvingly and send their waters to aid it. 

Almost all the wild flowers of the temperate zones are 
to be found in Alaska. Perhaps the most interesting of 
the wild blossoms because it has been taken for the Terri- 
torial flower is the forget-me-not. It is a pure, brilliant 
blue with a yellow centre, the blossom, though tiny, a 
trifle larger than the bloom in the States. The plant 
grows a foot high. It gives the impression of greater 
strength and vividness than the flower as most of us 
know it. A handful of the dainty blooms seems like a 
bit of the sky so wonderful is the color. 

Of the countless other blossoms it is difficult to say 
which impresses the most. The fireweed is in its season 
a sheet of flame over almost the whole of Alaska. It 
grows sometimes a yard high, is covered with a rose- 
magenta blossom, and is found in single stalks or dense 
patches wherever it can discover an inch of soil for 
flaunting its radiant beauty. The road on the trail from 
Fairbanks to the coast is lined with it. Even through the 
dark spruce and birch woods it runs a ribbon of color by 
the side of the roadway. 

Wild roses might also be said to be an universal flower. 
They grow larger and are more fragrant in Alaska than 
elsewhere. Burbank has said that the wild rose of Alaska 
is the most beautiful in the world. 

The lupines are numerous, and the wild pea, a rosy 
flower growing perhaps a foot high, spreads itself in 
great sheets. One of the loveliest of the wild flowers is 
the bluebell, clusters of dainty little bells hanging grace- 
fully on drooping stems possibly a foot or so high. The 
buds are a delicate pink and occasionally there are pink 



252 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

bells, a color combination that is ravishing. In some 
places a larger blue, bell-shaped flower, which has been 
called the wild harebell, is to be found. This does not 
grow so high as the bluebell, but its lovely blossoms, 
barely lifting their heads from the ground, have a care- 
less grace that is enchanting. 

Wild violets are to be found in quantity in the early 
spring, large, with stems a foot long, and in some sec- 
tions with a delicious fragrance. Wild lilies of the valley 
are another bloom of delicacy and sweetness. 

But a list of the wild flowers of Alaska would be a list 
of the beauties of the floral kingdom. Daisies of many 
kinds are here, and asters in variety. Wild geranium, 
lady's slipper, buttercups, larkspur, dandelion, heather, 
gentian, all and many others are to be found. 

The ground dogwood powders the earth with its snowy 
blossoms, water lilies and flags make gay the marshy 
places. One of these lilies is yellow with reddish edges to 
its golden petals and with a red, yellow and green centre 
that is a marvellous bit of floral architecture. Dwarf 
rhododendrons and other bushes add their burden of blos- 
soms to the general profusion and wild grasses wave 
their slender, graceful heads in delicate shades of purple, 
lavender, russet and green. 

Wild berries are to be found in variety and profusion. 
At one place along the coast in the southeastern part are 
miles of wild strawberries. Not many miles from White 
Horse is a patch fifteen miles long and four miles wide 
where they grow so thickly that in the early days the 
miners picked them by the gallon, put them in watertight 
casks in alternate layers of berries and sugar, placed these 
casks in the icy waters of mountain streams and pre- 
served the berries for months. Often they lasted till 
winter, when they froze, and the miners had frozen 



Forests and Flowers 253 

strawberries to deliciously top off their bacon and 
bannock. 

Many of the housewives of Alaska still use this method 
of preserving their berries, except that they put them 
in stone jars in their cellars. The cellars of many Alas- 
kan homes are really cold storage plants, for they are dug 
in ice. Blueberries are kept this way without fermenting 
in many a cellar in Fairbanks until February. 

Both high and low-bush blueberries or huckleberries 
grow in abundance in almost all parts of Alaska, being 
found on the Seward Peninsula in the vicinity of Nome. 
The huckleberries that grow well up on the mountains are 
a half inch and more in diameter and particularly delicious 
in flavor. The bushes are from three to four feet high. 
In lower regions a different variety not so large is found 
on bushes three to seven feet high. The Indians gather 
these berries, also salmon and service berries, dry them 
over a slow jfire, beat them to a paste, and make them into 
cakes about an inch thick. They also preserve the huckle- 
berries in oil, and Eskimo ice cream consists of berries 
mixed with oil and reindeer fat until foamy and then 
partly frozen. 

High and low-bush cranberries also grow plentifully 
and have a delicious, spicy flavor. Salmon berries are 
abundant, big, delicious berries that drop in the hand with 
a touch and which grow along the roadside and in tangled 
thickets in many parts of the Territory. Wild currants, 
both black and red, abound and are remarkable for the 
size of the fruit and the length of the branches. 

It has been estimated there are wild berries in Alaska 
sufficient for every bird, beast and human being in the 
Territory and with thousands of gallons to spare. 

Wild onions, parsnips, celery and rhubarb are to be 
found but are not much used, though Mr. S. J. Marsh, a 



254 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

prospector and geologist, says one could make his way to 
the Arctic Ocean and live on the wild vegetables, berries, 
game and fish to be found. Reverend A. P. Kashevaroff, 
a Russian missionary who spent many years in Alaska, has 
made quite a study of the edible wild greens and herbs. 
He speaks of a wild cucumber plant whose shoots re- 
semble asparagus tips and grow from five to six inches 
high. The plant has been given this name because these 
shoots have the odor and taste of cucumber. He also 
describes a plant called goose tongue that grows on tide 
lands and looks like grass. When freshly gathered and 
prepared in the right way it is as wholesome and delicious 
as spinach. Wild parsley, he says, can be used in the raw 
state for seasoning, the same as ordinary garden parsley, 
or it can be cooked as greens. It grows all over the Terri- 
tory. Wild rice is another widely distributed plant useful 
for food. The root is white, about the size of a small 
walnut, and is composed of small bulbs resembling rice 
grains. It can be used in place of potatoes. He even 
tells of a willow that resembles Brussels sprouts and is 
tender and juicy. 

Seaweed and kelp are found abundantly in the waters 
off the shore. The Indians use some of these seaweeds 
for food, drying them in the summer and making them 
into a pudding in the winter. 

The wild flowers are beautiful and the berries delicious, 
but, commercially speaking, the forests are the asset of 
value. The total area of the forests and woodlands is 
estimated at about one hundred million acres. Of this 
about twenty million acres contain lumber suitable for 
manufacturing purposes, which is more than the area of 
South Carolina, and nearly that of Maine or Indiana. Of 
the remainder, one half is classed as woodland carrying 
some saw timber but on which the trees are small in size, 



Forests and Flowers 255 

scattered and valuable chiefly as fuel. The other tree 
growth throughout the Territory is mostly stunted in 
character, scrubby and of little value. Originally almost 
half of the surface of Alaska was covered with timber of 
some kind, but in some sections much of this has been 
cut away owing to the needs for fuel. 

Practically all the merchantable timber of the Territory 
is now embraced within two national forest reserves, the 
Tongas, covering the entire southeastern archipelago, and 
the Chugach National Forest, extending along the coast 
from the Malaspina Glacier to Cook Inlet. The timbered 
areas in both of these national forests are chiefly on the 
thousands of large and small islands along the coast. 

The timber is dense, as much as twenty-five thousand 
feet per acre having been estimated in some places. The 
Chugach Forest is deceptive looking, for the timber along 
the shore is often scrubby, with dead trees much in evi- 
dence. But in the forest, spruce two to three feet in 
diameter and one hundred feet high is found. A single 
tree will often cut a thousand board feet, and from ten 
thousand to twenty thousand feet per acre has been cal- 
culated as the output in some places. In southeastern 
Alaska, spruce six feet in diameter and two hundred feet 
high has been found. 

The timber includes Sitka spruce, western hemlock, red 
and yellow cedar and a scattering of other kinds. The 
Sitka spruce is in great demand for airplanes. It is 
tough, pliable, light and free from defects. Quite a lum- 
ber industry has sprung up in this part of Alaska due to 
this demand. A number of new sawmills have been 
started and are filling large orders. 

The timber of this region is also used for boxes, es- 
pecially for the canneries, for furniture, piano backs, and 
oars for racing boats. Its greatest use, however, is for 



256 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

paper pulp of which the world is at present suffering from 
a shortage. This industry could spring up in scores of 
places along the coast, prove profitable to its owners and 
greatly reduce the cost of certain essentials for the people 
of the States. 

The forests of the interior consist of white birch, pop- 
lar, balsam-poplar, black cottonwood and aspen. The 
timber is small and is used mainly for fuel purposes and 
for building the log houses of traders and settlers. These 
forests are being rapidly decimated as they are the chief 
source of fuel for mining and steamboat needs. When 
Alaska's coal is opened up and transportation makes its 
available, these forests will have an opportunity to re- 
cuperate. 



CHAPTER XIX 



THE WILD ANIMAL LIFE 



A GREAT GAME COUNTRY. CaRIBOU IN ABUNDANCE. ALASKA 
MOOSE THE LARGEST OF ITS KIND. ThE BIG KODIAK BEAR. 

Birds in great variety. 

One of the charms of Alaska is the wild animal life 
that roams so freely over the mountains, valleys and 
tundra, and the fish that leap so joyously in the streams. 
If the country had no wealth of minerals, no fertile val- 
leys, no towering snow peaks, or beautiful rivers, its 
abundant and varied animal life would still be a lure. 
It is one of the most interesting chapters that nature 
offers here. 

Of the larger animals it would be difficult to say which 
is the more abundant or best known. Honors could 
probably be divided among the caribou, the moose and 
the bear. The caribou is perhaps less generally known 
than the moose or the bear and, therefore, more interest- 
ing. It has been called the wild reindeer and in the 
records of the early explorers of Alaska was generally 
called reindeer. But it is not the reindeer of Norway 
or Sweden and which has recently been introduced into 
Alaska, though reindeer herders of the Territory have 
discussed the possibility of interbreeding their herd with 
caribou. The name is said to be a contraction or cor- 
ruption of caire boeuf, "square ox," a term applied to 
the animal by the French Canadians. 

There are two varieties, the woodland, which is about 
four feet high and weighs between three and four hun- 

257 



258 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

dred pounds, and the barren ground caribou, which is 
much smaller. It frequents marshy and swampy grounds 
and is fond of ice-covered lakes. It lives on mosses, 
leaves, grass and lichens, and became known as reindeer 
because it eats what has been called reindeer moss. 

The flesh is excellent as food and the tongue and kid- 
neys are considered great delicacies. The hair is said to 
have floating qualities superior to cork. The Eskimos 
make coats and sleeping bags from the skin that are 
light in weight and impervious to the cold. 

Stories are being circulated as to its extermination. 
But it still roams Alaska in countless herds. A miner 
within the year ran across a migration which he roughly 
estimated to number ten thousand. Others have seen 
herds estimated to number fifty thousand. At certain 
seasons they migrate and at these migrations follow cer- 
tain well-known routes. These " crossings," as they are 
called, are known, and it is at these places where they 
are seen in their greatest numbers. A description of a 
recent crossing witnessed shows that these animals are 
as numerous as they were fifty years ago. " For forty 
miles we were running through one continuous mass of 
caribou," says this man. " The narrow valley and high 
bald mountains on each side all the way swarmed with 
animals. Never before did I have the slightest idea of 
what a herd of caribou signifies." 

The moose of Alaska is of the kind to delight the 
heart of the big game sportsman. It is a tremendous 
animal, the largest of its kind, and is so big that it has 
been classed by itself as a separate species. It has a tre- 
mendous spread of antlers, a spread of from five to six 
feet being not uncommon. It is found in many parts of 
Alaska, the only exception being perhaps the southeast- 
em section. Those of the Kenai Peninsula are the larg- 



The Wild Animal life 259 

est in size. Tourists often have the good fortune to 
see one of these great animals swimming a small stream 
or across a cove or bay. 

In color the moose is brownish, except the legs which 
are yellowish. It feeds in the early morning, again at 
noon and in the evening, its food being the leaves and 
tender branches of the birch, alder and such trees. In 
summer it is rather solitary, but in winter it gathers in 
small parties in what are termed moose yards. 

The baby moose is a gentle, playful animal with large 
beautiful eyes and is often made a pet. In fact in almost 
every town in Alaska some one has a pet baby moose. 
As it grows older, it usually returns to the woods or is 
shipped by its owners to some zoological garden in the 
States. 

Bears are so numerous in Alaska that in many parts 
they are a pest. It is doubtful if in any other part of 
the world they are found in such numbers and such va- 
riety. At least thirteen different kinds are said to be 
distributed over the Territory, though they fall under 
four general types, the brown, grizzly, black and polar 
bear. 

The fame of the brown or Kodiak bear of Alaska has 
spread the world over. He is the largest of all known 
bears and is truly a giant in size. Measure for yourself 
a length of from ten to twelve feet, imagine if you can 
a weight of fourteen hundred to sixteen hundred pounds 
and you will get some idea of the Kodiak bear. His skin 
when spread out resembles in size a buffalo skin. Until 
these skins are actually seen one can scarcely believe bears 
of such size exist. But after viewing the plentiful num- 
ber of these skins to be found in Alaska and visualizing 
as best one can the animal that has inhabited them, these 
enormous bears become a reality. They are as ferocious 



260 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

as they are large. Many people have been killed by them, 
and the stories of narrow escapes are numerous. Cattle 
are attacked by them, and on Kodiak Island, where at- 
tempts are being made at cattle raising, many cattle have 
been destroyed. At present they are protected in this 
region by game laws for the benefit of the big game 
hunters, but Alaskans believe that these game laws should 
be repealed owing to the increase of these animals and 
the multiplying frequency of their depredations. 

The grizzly bear is met with more often than is desired 
by miners and prospectors. He is found most generally 
in the mountains of the Yukon country and in the Mt. 
McKinley and Copper River regions and in the Kenai 
Peninsula. Silvertip is the name commonly given the 
Alaska variety from the fact that the points of his light 
gray hair are white. 

The black bear is common and very numerous in nearly 
all parts of Alaska. He is seen prowling the woods, 
making his dinner oflf the luscious berries growing thickly 
there. Often while whirling along in an auto, one of 
these black bears will be seen lumbering off through the 
woods frightened from his meal by the machine. This 
black bear is, as a rule, inoffensive, and will not disturb 
one if not molested. 

The glacier bear is a species of the black bear. It is 
found principally in the mountains of the St. Elias range 
but it is little known. It is hoary gray, resembling some- 
what a silver fox, sometimes with a bluish tinge. Its 
nose is black, its feet brown. Its coloring has something 
of the gray-blue beauty of the glacier with its sombre 
touches of shadows and moraines and thus it gets its 
name. 

The polar bear is found in the Arctic regions. One 
does not hear as much of it as of the other bears of 



The Wild Animal Life 261 

Alaska, But it is quite numerous in the unfrequented 
parts of the Arctic, and according to Vilhjalmur Ste- 
fansson quite unafraid of man. Polar bears, lured by 
the smell of seal meat, came into his camp in large num- 
bers and could not be frightened away. They had to be 
shot. 

The mountain sheep and the mountain goat are other 
prized game animals of Alaska. They are not so easily 
hunted as the bear, moose and caribou as they haunt the 
higher mountain peaks. They are found in goodly num- 
ber in the mountains of the interior. One section of the 
Coast Mountains is known as the Sheep Hills so numer- 
ous are the mountain sheep here, and it is a favorite 
hunting ground for sportsmen. The flesh of the moun- 
tain sheep is extremely palatable and is said to be far 
more delicious than that of the domestic mutton. It is 
claimed by those who know the Alaska sheep that it is 
very different from the bighorn of the Rockies and that 
though existing here for years has only lately been 
brought to the attention of scientists. As yet very few 
are in outside collections. 

Deer are not generally abundant in Alaska. One species 
is found in the southeastern coast region, a small, shy 
animal that ranges from the sea level to timber line. At 
one time quite a number of these were to be found in the 
neighborhood of Wrangell. But throughout the Terri- 
tory generally, deer are little found in comparison with 
other game animals. Lately some of the islands off the 
coast have been stocked with deer as a food measure. 

There are some wolves, the big timber wolf being 
among them, but they are not much hunted. Far north 
in the Arctic region, the musk-ox is said to roam, but 
few authentic reports come of him in Alaskan territory. 
This animal is said to be very valuable both for its meat 



262 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

and for its hair, or wool, as some call its coat, and as 
there are vast grazing grounds suitable for it in Alaska, 
its introduction and propagation as an industry, it is 
thought by many, would prove more profitable than that 
of the reindeer. 

Rabbits, called low bush moose by the Indians, Arctic 
hare and other small animals abound. 

The bird life of Alaska is quite as prolific, varied and 
interesting as the game. With the coming of the first 
warm days the birds begin to appear, first on the south- 
east coast and then gradually northward until the woods 
and streams and even the Arctic tundra are alive with 
the flutter of their wings and the melody of their songs. 
The long trough, if one may so call it, between the moun- 
tains of the coast and those of the interior along the 
western part of the continent make an unobstructed and 
pleasant summer route to Alaska for the birds. Across 
western Canada and down the Yukon affords another 
passageway. And so they journey northward in great 
flocks and add to life in the far Northland their beauty 
and songs and lively activity. 

Perhaps no one welcomes them more than those living 
far north on Bering Sea or the Arctic Ocean. Here 
the arrival of birds in the spring is eagerly waited for 
and heralded with joy. The wild goose is usually the 
first to arrive. The ground is still covered with snow, 
the ice pack covers the sea to the far horizon. All is yet 
white and cold. But in the interior things are farther 
advanced, and from there some fine spring morning a 
wild goose starts westward and northward. High over- 
head he flies, exulting in the first breath of spring and 
uttering his loud calls. The first note brings white 
people and Eskimos to their doors and the shout goes up, 
" Goose ! Goose ! " and they know spring has come. The 



The Wild Animal Life 263 

little house birds do not arrive so soon, but some warmish 
morning when the snow is melting and little streams 
running noisily, a sharp, "Zip! Zip! " is heard, and the 
sparrows have arrived. 

Miners and prospectors in lonely cabins welcome the 
birds as joyfully as do the dwellers by Arctic seas. One 
of them speaking of the first thrush of the season said : 
" I was in the mountains just a little way off the Yukon 
when suddenly a bird began to sing, the sweetest bird 
song I think I ever heard. It was clear and joyous like 
a bobolink, and strong like a robin, and sweet like a 
thrush. It began at first low and soft and grew louder 
and louder and stronger and stronger until it seemed to 
fill the air. I stood perfectly still enjoying it and trying 
to see the bird. Finally I discovered him on a dead tree. 
It was a thrush." 

The thrushes are well represented in Alaska, One 
hears them in the thickets up the mountain sides at 
Ketchikan and finds them in many places during his jour- 
ney throughout the country. Even at midnight during 
the season when it is light their songs will peal forth. 

But many other old friends are here, the red-breasted 
nuthatch, the chickadee, the robin, the warbler, the finch, 
sparrows in variety, kingfishers, woodpeckers, wagtails 
and swallows. To the far north comes the longspur, a 
beautiful bird with head and breast jet black, white stripes 
back of the eyes, the back of the neck reddish, and the 
back black and brown. His song is suggestive of the 
skylark's, for he seems so full of the ecstasy of life that 
he must mount in the air to pour it forth. He rises 
slowly, pauses a moment, and then sinks gently down, 
pouring out his exquisite liquid notes. They are not 
so powerful as those of the lark but they are wondrously 
sweet and pure. 



264 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

The jay does not forget Alaska and he is Httle better 
hked here than elsewhere. He is variously called whis- 
key jack, camp robber, moose bird and the like, and he is 
found well distributed over the Territory. A dweller in 
the Arctic tells of an encounter with one that bespeaks 
almost a sense of humor in the bird. The camper and 
his companion had made a fire of driftwood and prepared 
and eaten their breakfast close to a little patch of leafless, 
scraggly willows near the shore of Bering Sea. The 
bushes were stunted and little more than stems and 
branches and one would not think of a bird taking refuge 
in them. Breakfast over, the party launched their skin 
boat and started away, but with the first stroke of the 
paddle a shrill, exultant note sounded from the shore and 
made them stop and look back. There on the tip of the 
largest willow was a jay. Both his attitude and cries 
seemed to denote an impish delight in their present sur- 
prise and their failure to see him when within a few feet 
of them at breakfast. After seeming to enjoy their 
amazement for a few moments, he fell upon the scraps 
they had left and made his breakfast. 

The dainty little humming bird is found along the 
southeast coast and sometimes in the valleys at the head- 
waters of the Yukon. 

Alaska has many game birds. Chief of these is the 
ptarmigan, which is found well distributed throughout 
the Territory. There are several species, the largest 
being a good-sized bird weighing possibly a pound or a 
pound and a half. This has a large " meaty " breast and 
is good eating. The plumage of the ptarmigan in the 
summer is a mottled buff and brown. In the winter this 
changes to a snow white and when a flock of birds sud- 
denly rises from the ground, the effect is that of an ex- 
plosion of the snowy surface. In their winter dress the 



The Wild Animal Life 265 

ptarmigan are difficult to detect against the blank white- 
ness of the tundra and hills. They are such a valuable 
food supply for the far north that they should not be 
allowed to be ruthlessly hunted. 

Birds of prey are numerous and include owls of va- 
rious kinds, eagles and hawks. Ravens are found in 
great numbers. At Wrangell, Sitka and other southeast 
coast towns they are to be seen about the villages, and 
even as far west as Unalaska, they perch in large numbers 
on the roofs of houses and hop around among the chick- 
ens as unafraid as the fowls themselves. They seem 
to take great delight in flying, and enter with zest into 
aerial nose and dive and tail spins that would make a 
modern ace look like a neophyte. They will drop a long 
distance in a series of head over heels somersaults that 
make one dizzy to watch, finishing with a long glide on 
almost motionless wings. They seem to delight to take 
these spectacular flights during high gales as if revelling 
in the wind and the struggle with the elements. All the 
birds of a colony will gather and soar and turn and twist, 
uttering at the same time a medley of strange cries and 
croakings that makes the exhibition both weird and 
exhilarating. 

The water-birds of Alaska are noted. If the Terri- 
tory had no other bird life its water-fowl would still 
make it take a prominent position in the bird life of 
the country. In some places they literally swarm the 
coasts and islands by the millions. The cliffs of the 
Pribilof and Diomede Islands are thronged with murres, 
murrelets, auklets, cormorants and gulls, and when dis- 
turbed they fill the air with whirring forms that make 
the islands appear like some new kind of beehive. 

The Aleuts eat auklets and catch them with nets much 
after the fashion of butterfly hunting. 



266 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



Gulls are incredibly numerous all along the coast. 
They swarm about the canneries in the fishing season 
and are extremely picturesque perched in long sedate 
rows on the tops of the buildings. There are several 
kinds of gulls in the Territory, those of the Bering Sea 
and Arctic regions being the most distinctive. The large 
jaeger or skua is found here and has been called by the 
Eskimo the " cannibal " because of a tradition that at 
one time it ate men. The largest Alaska gulls are those 
that reach the far north and whose cry in the spring is 
most welcome to the seal hunter far out at sea on fields of 
ice, because they are the first birds to reach these far 
regions, and he knows spring is at hand. 

Ducks are numerous, including the eiderdown, also 
swans, loons and geese. Among the geese is the beau- 
tiful emperor goose with its snowy head, dusky throat, 
and satiny gray body, each feather with a distinctive 
black and gray marking. 

At times, especially upon the approach of a storm, these 
various water-birds join in a grand chorus. Thousands 
sometimes take part, and if some Wagner were only 
present to translate it into instrumental form it would 
make a majestic and impressive concert. The bugling 
of swans, the clanging of geese, the peculiar note of the 
loon, the calls of ducks, the cries of gulls and terns, the 
birds all apparently in a state of great excitement, make 
a medley of sound that melts into an harmonious whole 
of novel melody and beauty. 

Asia contributes some birds that add to the interest 
of Alaskan bird life. Some twenty species of birds of 
the Old World have been found on the coasts of western 
Alaska, The golden plover, a curlew that winters in the 
Polynesian Islands, teal, sand-pipers, the Siberian red- 
spotted, blue-throated warbler, the tufted duck, the 



The Wild Animal Life 267 

Kamchatkan cuckoo and the Japanese hawfinch are 
among the number. 

One bird of Alaska that attracts much attention is the 
tufted puffin. Sailors call it the sea parrot because of 
its gay headdress, but its frivolous headwear in no way 
makes it coquettish. It is an exceedingly staid, dignified 
bird and the contrast between its red bill and plumes, 
nodding like cap tassels, and its grave, solemn demeanor 
is almost funny. It spends much time standing abso- 
lutely silent and motionless before its burrows, and it 
rarely emits a sound except when caught and hurt and 
then it groans in a low, mournful fashion. 

The plumage is darkish, but this sombre effect is re- 
lieved by the brilliance of the decorative touches. The 
face is white and is prolonged each side behind into long, 
waving feather horns of a rich deep straw color. The 
eyelids are a brilliant red as is also the large strong beak 
finished off at the base with a touch of green. The feet 
are bright vermilion. Truly gorgeous are these birds as 
they stand at the entrance to their burows, for they make 
their homes and nests in tunnels three to four feet deep 
and so close together that an acre of ground will hold 
almost three thousand of these burrows. 

The baby puffin is a real little puff ball of down and 
fat and it is thought that it is his appearance that has 
given the name, for he easily could be blown away, so 
downy is he, were it not for his too, too solid flesh. 

The Aleuts capture these birds for their flesh and their 
tough skin, which is used for making the parka, the warm 
winter garment of the Eskimo. About fifty puffin skins, 
feather side in, make a garment almost impervious to 
cold. 



CHAPTER XX 

the rich mineral resources of the territory 

The gold output and methods of mining. Valuable copper 
DEPOSITS. The coal and oil scarcely yet touched. Prac- 
tically THE ONLY TIN IN THE UNITED STATES IN ALASKA. 

Other minerals in variety. The Bureau of Mines and its 

HELPFUL assistance. 

Alaska is incredibly rich in minerals. Its gold at- 
tracted first notice, and for years held public attention, 
but to-day its copper and coal are coming prominently to 
the fore. But there are few minerals which Alaska does 
not possess. It is a great treasure house only a few doors 
of which have been opened and through these but the 
merest entrance has been made to the domain within. 
With the exception of a few large mining companies 
working with the latest machinery on an extensive scale, 
and this has been done only rather recently, mining in 
Alaska has been the work of the prospector with crude 
implements and the need of getting these and his supplies 
to his camp in the face of tremendous handicaps in the 
way of transportation. The fact so often stated that the 
surface of Alaska has only been scratched is quite true. 

In spite, however, of the limited nature of the mining 
and the vast territory still unexplored, Alaska since its 
purchase has produced more than $300,000,000 in gold, 
$100,000,000 in copper and other minerals to bring the 
total close to. if not over, the half billion mark, and this, 
as has been said, from comparatively small areas, and in 
the main by primitive methods of mining. 

268 



Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 269 

Gold has been discovered in widely separated areas of 
Alaska. In fact there is scarcely any place in Alaska 
where, as the prospectors say, " colors " cannot be found. 
The Territory would seem to be one vast gold field. But 
it does not follow that gold mining is carried on in all 
parts of the Territory. The cost of transportation and 
the lack of fuel make mining unprofitable in many places 
in Alaska, and in many sections where gold is known to 
exist it is not being mined. 

At present gold mining is being carried on at Ketchi- 
kan, at Juneau, at various places on the Yukon and north 
of the river toward the Arctic region, in the interior at 
Fairbanks, in the Kuskokwim valley, westward on the 
Kenai and Alaska Peninsulas, on the Seward Peninsula, 
and as far north here as Candle on the Arctic Ocean. This 
shows how widely distributed the gold is, for these mines 
are being worked profitably. The yield from the Fair- 
banks section in one year has been as high as $6,000,000, 
and the total yield since its discovery there has been more 
than $66,000,000. The output of the Seward Peninsula 
since gold mining began there has been more than $74,- 
000,000. So the tale could run from one section to an- 
other. Alaska, in its short gold mining history, has 
poured out a veritable flood of the precious metal. For 
it has been less than forty years since gold was discovered 
in paying quantity and only about twenty years since 
Alaska has been systematically and earnestly prospected 
for gold. 

Gold was first discovered at Juneau in 1880, at Forty- 
mile in 1886, at Circle City in 1894, on the Kenai Penin- 
sula in 1896. Then came the great discovery on the Klon- 
dike and the rush of miners to the country. The over- 
flow from this poured into many parts of Alaska and thus 
the Fairbanks district, the Copper River region, Nome, 



270 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

the Iditerod and the Koyukuk were eventually opened. 
But, as can be seen, Alaska is yet young in its gold pro- 
duction. 

The greater number of mines in Alaska are placer, 
though the output of the few quartz mines operating al- 
most equals that of the many placer operations. But 
placer mining, except dredging and hydraulicking, is the 
simplest and easiest method of mining and requires the 
least capital. The glittering grains and nuggets that lie 
in gravel sometimes in the bed of a stream or in the 
" benches " on the sides are the object of the placer 
miner's quest. He can secure them with so little of an 
outfit as a pan, though, of course, for work over any ex- 
tended period of time he will need more implements of 
work than a pan. 

The principle of placer mining is to wash out by water 
the gold that is mixed with sand or gravel. The gold, 
being heavier, sinks to the bottom and the other material 
is carried away. 

Although a miner may get colors on a creek, to secure 
the gold in paying quantity he must go to bed rock, and 
this necessitates digging. On some of the creeks in the 
Klondike the creek bed was bed rock, which accounts for 
the remarkable amount of gold taken out in such short 
periods of time. The work was merely a matter of sep- 
arating the gold from the waste material. But this con- 
dition seldom occurs. Usually bedrock must be reached 
by digging, and in some cases shafts quite deep must be 
sunk. The pay dirt is brought up by windlass and bucket, 
or by more improved methods of hoisting, if capital is 
sufificient. If the mine is in the side of a hill, the gold- 
bearing earth is brought out with cars and cable. It may 
be immediately washed, especially if the work is done by 
sluicing, or it may be piled up in what are called dumps. 



Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 271 

This is the case if it is mined in winter. Sometimes it is 
necessary to build a crib about these dumps to enclose the 
dirt. 

An improvement upon panning is rocking. This is 
still a primitive process, but it shows the originality and 
resourcefulness of the miner thrown upon himself in 
the wilderness for devices to hasten and shorten his 
labor. The rocker is merely a box with rockers on it like 
a cradle and a handle nailed on it with which to do the 
rocking. On the top is a screen to catch the coarser ma- 
terial while the fine drops through upon a slanting board 
when the motion of rocking carries it out at the bottom 
and the gold is retained on a ledge or cleat nailed on for 
the purpose. The water necessary for the separation of 
the gold from the dirt is poured in by hand. Many of 
these old rockers are to be found in the gold regions. On 
some, if wire screening was scarce, sheets of tin punched 
with big holes were used. 

If a good supply of water is available the method most 
commonly employed in placer mining is sluicing. A box 
is made as long as space and materials permit with the 
top open and cleats or riffles nailed at regular distances 
apart across the bottom. Into this box the dirt is shov- 
elled or dumped, water is turned in, and the earth, rocks, 
and all such material carried along by the force of the 
water to the opening at the end, and the gold which sinks 
is caught by the riffles at the bottom. The operation of 
taking the gold out is known as the clean-up and is the 
great event of the work, for it tells the tale of success or 
failure. Sluicing is perhaps the easiest, quickest and 
most profitable method of placer mining. Any one who 
can drive a nail or use a saw can make a sluice box, the 
dirt is shovelled in, and the water does the rest. 

Dredging and hydraulicking are two other methods of 



272 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

placer mining. But these require considerable capital. 
Gold dredges are expensive. Hydraulicking, though not 
so costly in itself, requires an enormous quantity of water 
with a tremendous pressure and this usually means the 
building of a ditch, which in Alaska is expensive. But 
both dredging and hydraulicking are being done in dif- 
ferent parts of Alaska. Ores that will not yield profitable 
returns by the slow hand processes can be worked this 
way. As the cost of mining decreases through better 
transportation and lower priced fuel, many gold areas not 
being mined can be profitably worked by dredge or 
hydraulic. 

In all this mining in Alaska the ground has to be 
thawed. This is done with wood fires built right on the 
ground, with hot boulders or with steam. Steam is, of 
course, used whenever possible, but a steam plant, even of 
the simplest kind, is again a case of capital and not all 
miners can afford it. 

There are many quartz prospects in Alaska, but as yet 
quartz mining is not done extensively, as this method 
means a large plant and much machinery. The chief 
quartz mining is at Juneau in the mills of the Treadwell, 
the Alaska-Gastineau and the Alaska-Juneau mines. These 
mines, because of their output, are famous. Already this 
section alone has yielded $75,000,000 in gold and some 
of these mines have only been working since 1915. 

John Muir when in Alaska in the '70's expressed the 
belief that valuable quartz lodes would be found on the 
mainland east of Baranof Island and that the true min- 
eral belt would follow the trend of the shore. His words 
have proved true, for though what is known as the Juneau 
gold belt is somewhat northeast of this island it extends 
for a distance north and south along the coast and in this 
belt much of the richest gold mining of Alaska has been 







^^'.^ '^^ 




Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 273 

done. It is all quartz practically and from thirty to 
thirty-eight per cent of the gold output of Alaska is from 
this one section. 

Gold was discovered at Juneau by Richard Harris and 
Joe Juneau in 1880. They discovered it in the mountains 
back of Juneau whence the Alaska-Gastineau and Alaska- 
Juneau mines now draw their ore. The discovery of the 
famous Treadwell lode on Douglas Island across the chan- 
nel was made by a French Canadian, Pierre Erussard, 
known as French Pete. He was married to an Indian and 
lived on the beach near the Indian settlement, not far 
from the site of the present town of Juneau. With 
his wife's brothers and some other Indians he landed 
on the beach of Douglas Island one November morning in 
1880, about a month after gold had been found by Harris 
and Juneau in the canyon near his home. It was, no 
doubt, the excitement of this discovery that made his 
gaze unusually keen. An outcrop of gold-bearing quartz 
on the hillside caught his eye. A little creek was trickling 
down the slope, its waters exposing the outcrop of white 
quartz. This little creek has long since been swallowed 
up in the famous Glory Hole of the Treadwell mine and 
its clear waters changed into a stream of gold. But here 
is was that French Pete, as he was called, made his dis- 
covery. 

He received little benefit from it himself, but sold his 
claim to John Treadwell for $505.00 to pay a pressing 
bill. 

One month after French Pete made his discovery a 
handful of prospectors from Sitka on their way to the 
strike made by Juneau and Harris also landed on Doug- 
las Island, attracted by what seemed to be the outcropping 
of a quartz lode. One of them scooped up a pan of gravel 
from the base of the lode on the beach and washed it out. 



274 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

The find was so rich, the prospector excitedly shouted, 
"We have it, boys, almost the ready bullion!" They 
staked their claims and called the mine the Ready Bullion. 
It is to-day part of the Tread well group and at present 
the only mine being worked. A cave-in has occurred in 
the other mines of the Tread well Company and they are 
flooded with water. But the rich ore is still there and 
the company is hard at work devising plans to resume 
mining in them. The three which at this writing (1918) 
are not being worked are the Tread well, the Mexican and 
the Seven Hundred. These with the Ready Bullion 
comprise the Treadwell group. 

In the early days the mining here was all done in open 
pits or glory holes. The Treadwell glory hole became 
world famous because of the amount of gold taken out. 
But finally the depth reached became so great that under- 
ground mining had to be resorted to and that is the 
method employed at present. 

Out under Gastineau Channel, over which the boats 
loaded with tourists sail so serenely, the ore is being 
mined, loaded on trams and sent to the shaft where it is 
hoisted not only the thousands of feet, for the depth 
reached is already twenty-eight hundred feet, but on up 
a half hundred feet more where it dumps itself with a 
tremendous crash and roar and rumble and comes tearing 
down chutes, being broken into smaller pieces en route, 
until it reaches the stamp rooms. Here stamp batteries 
that look like pipe organs in work clothes, for they are 
black and grim and determined and weigh twelve hundred 
pounds each, pulverize it, and on it goes to the concentra- 
tion tables whose gentle rocking motion must be soothing 
after its rapid and violent journey. Here the sheep and 
goats of the mineral world are separated, the one to do 
much service for the world as a means of exchange, the 



Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 275 

other as refuse to go back in the mine to fill up the cav- 
ernous space made there by the dredging of the ore. 

The noise in these stamp mills is indescribable. The 
voice has absolutely no power to make an impression. 
One can talk with all the strength he has but seemingly 
he makes no sound. The sensation is extremely odd. One 
knows he is talking with all his lung power, yet apparently 
no sound issues from his lips. John Burroughs says, 
" Niagara is a soft hum beside Treadwell." 

The rock before it is crushed and made to yield its 
golden product is most ordinary looking. One would 
never suspect it of hiding anything of value within its 
commonplace exterior. Here and there one may see, if it 
is pointed out, a pin point of glittering material. But 
that is all. Yet the Treadwell mines alone have produced 
$67,000,000 in gold. The ore yields but two dollars to 
the ton, scarcely worth working some might think. But 
the large quantity handled and the cheapness of operation 
make the work profitable. 

The Treadwell mines are modern in every way. Far 
back in the mountains on the mainland a ditch brings 
water to a big electric plant where electricity is generated 
and carried on thick cables to the mines. Compressed air 
is used for much of the work. Water power and steam- 
generated electric power are also used. Crude oil is used 
for generating steam either for power or heat and the 
company has a storage capacity in steel tanks of one hun- 
dred and eighty thousand barrels. The annual consump- 
tion is about two hundred thousand barrels of forty-two 
gallons each. 

In addition to the actual mining, many other activities 
subsidiary to the main business are carried on. The 
company maintains machine shops, blacksmith shops, 
boiler shops, sheet-metal works, a foundry and carpenter 



276 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

shop and many others. It provides a lodging house and 
mess hall where excellent meals are served, conducts a 
general store and market and has built a number of cot- 
tages for employees in which steam heat, electricity and 
running hot and cold water are supplied. There are 
also a good library and a club house where are bowling 
alleys, a pool room and various means of recreation. 

The methods in the big mines on the mainland, the one 
at Thane, the other at the southern end of Juneau, are a 
little different. The ore is mined back in the mountains 
and brought through long tunnels to the top of the build- 
ings that seem to cascade down the mountain side. Here 
the ore cars are run into what look like huge iron cylin- 
ders but which are technically known as tipples, because 
by rotating they tip the ore out into bins beneath and then 
it begins its downward journey. It is fed into crushers 
with huge iron jaws and then into various other compli- 
cated machines, some of which look for all the world like 
huge meat choppers. Thence the large pieces go one 
road, the finer material another, till both again join on 
travelling conveyors to other crushing ore bins and 
feeders and ball mills where if not yet sufficiently crushed 
they are thoroughly pulverized. The ore then journeys 
to settling tanks and finally to the gently rocking concen- 
tration tables where the gold settles in one line, the silver, 
lead and iron in others, making very pretty color effects, 
and the waste material runs off by itself. There is much 
re-treatment in these mills so that nothing of value es- 
capes except some iron which is not found in sufficient 
quantity to be worth saving by any present process. It 
is believed, however, that some method will be discovered 
by which it will be found profitable to save the iron. 

These mines also have their workmen's homes, their 
clubs, and one has a big hydro-electric plant with a con- 



Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 277 

Crete dam one hundred sixty-five feet high and seven hun- 
dred twenty feet long on the crest, which permits the de- 
Hvery of six thousand horsepower the year around. A 
second plant of twelve thousand horsepower is now under 
construction. 

One of these mines can handle twelve thousand tons of 
ore a day and is planning to increase its capacity to twenty 
thousand daily; the other handles eight thousand tons, 
making a total of twenty thousand tons a day at present, 
which gives some idea of the amount of mining done in 
these groups alone and of the value of the products of 
this section. There are several other quartz mines in the 
vicinity of Juneau which though not working on so ex- 
tensive a scale as these are still good producers and help 
make Juneau one of the most prosperous cities in Alaska. 

There are quartz lodes in the vicinity of Fairbanks and 
on the Chandalar, north of the Yukon. Those near Fair- 
banks it is believed will outclass the product of the placer 
mines there. But quartz development in other parts of 
Alaska is waiting lower cost of transportation and fuel. 

The large companies usually melt their own gold and 
mould it into bricks, but the individual miner is apt to 
take his dust to a bank, where he either sells it outright or 
lets them melt it and assay it and then pay him its value. 

The government issues bulletins telling how to acquire 
mining claims and giving the latest legislation affecting 
them. 

The copper of Alaska may prove even more valuable 
than its gold, for comparatively little is known of its 
copper deposits and of those that are known few are be- 
ing mined. The average prospector is after gold, not 
copper, for gold will bring him immediate returns and can 
be mined if necessary with the crudest implements. Cop- 
per mining is expensive. It requires capital. Thus the 



278 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

copper of Alaska has not had the attention from the only 
class that has so far penetrated the country to any extent 
as has its gold. 

The presence of copper has, however, long been known. 
The Russians heard of it from the Indians but seemed to 
have little accurate knowledge of its location beyond 
the fact that it was in the region now known as the Cop- 
per and White River district. The Indian word for cop- 
per is Chiti, and many of the Indian names for the streams 
and landmarks of this section were compounds of this 
word, such as Chitina, Chititu and others. 

During the gold rush days the miners that came in by 
way of Valdez, Cordova, or the Prince William Sound or 
Cook Inlet country heard tales of great deposits of cop- 
per. Some of those who struck across country for the 
Klondike or Fairbanks found copper. One of these re- 
ported seeing a sheet of native copper a half inch thick 
projecting a foot from the face of a cliff. Others reported 
copper nuggets ranging from the size of a pea to a pump- 
kin in the gravels of valleys. Veins twenty feet wide were 
seen extending for miles. Two men of a party sent to 
look for forage for horses saw a green stretch on a hill- 
side which they took for good pasturage but when they 
reached it they found it was copper. 

But no matter how rich were the finds, they were, in 
the main, inaccessible. These deposits lay behind barriers 
of high mountains, in among glaciers, with rapid turbu- 
lent rivers as the only thoroughfare, and so though some 
prospected and even took up claims little actual mining 
was done. 

Then capital became interested, the Copper River and 
Northwestern Railroad was built and copper mining be- 
gan. In one week in 1916, six ships left Cordova with 
copper ore valued at $7,200,000, the price paid for Alaska. 



Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 279 

But the work is yet in its very infancy. Though it is said 
there is a billion dollars' worth of copper in sight in 
Alaska, and though there has been found one nugget 
alone that weighed three tons, the cost of mining is so 
high that there has to be a large percentage of copper in 
the ore to make the work pay. All the ore at present has 
to be shipped to the States to be smelted. This means 
much re-handling and a long and costly journey. There- 
fore, only high grade ore can be mined. There is plenty 
of coal in Alaska suitable for smelters and it is right in 
the neighborhood of the copper deposits. When this is 
developed, as it quickly will be as soon as the government 
modifies some of its conservation policies, smelters will 
be erected and the great copper deposits of Alaska will 
pour their treasures out for the world. 

At present the copper deposits of the Copper River 
Valley are the ones best known and most worked because 
of the railroad here. But the copper zone in this section 
extends east through the Wrangell Mountains to the 
White River and White Horse countries and westward to 
the coast and islands of Prince William Sound. It is 
estimated by geologists that if the copper deposits of the 
Chitina country were opened and all other copper mines 
closed, there would be enough copper for all the world's 
needs. 

It is found also on Prince of Wales Island, in the 
neighborhood of Ketchikan, and on the islands of this 
locality. It has been discovered also on the Alaska Penin- 
sula, in the Knik and Turnagain regions, and in various 
other places on the Kenai Peninsula. Up near the head 
of Chilkat River, which empties into the Lynn Canal, it 
has been found, and a belt has been reported southeast of 
Fairbanks in the Tanana Valley. But as has been said, 
nobody knows where copper may be found in Alaska for 



280 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

it has not been looked for as assiduously as gold and no- 
body can hazard a guess as to its ultimate value, for even 
in some of these regions where it is known to be there are 
no transportation facilities whatever. To reach these 
sections with mining materials costs from five hundred to 
two thousand dollars a ton freightage. With such a 
handicap, copper deposits, no matter how rich, must re- 
main undeveloped. 

Alaska is rich in coal. The United States Geological 
Survey estimates more than twelve thousand square miles 
of coal deposits. In the report of the survey it is stated 
that, " It is probably safe to say that the minimum esti- 
mate of Alaska's coal resources should be placed at one 
hundred and fifty billion tons and that the actual tonnage 
may be many times this amount. These resources are far 
in excess of the original supply of Pennsylvania." And 
a great area of Alaska is as yet practically unexplored. 

The most desirable coal fields so far known are in the 
Matanuska, Nenana and Bering River regions. The 
Matanuska section lies to the eastward of Anchorage and 
is reached by the government railroad. A small amount 
of coal is being mined here for the use of the Alaska En- 
gineering Commission. The saving which the mining of 
Alaska coal will bring is shown by the fact that even this 
small amount of mining has reduced the cost of coal from 
sixteen and eighteen dollars a ton to eight and ten dollars. 
And this mining is but the very beginning, with 
neither transportation nor mining equipment on its most 
efficient basis. 

The Matanuska fields are about seventy-five miles from 
Anchorage, which is an open port eight months in the 
year. But the government railroad runs from here to 
Seward, a distance of something more than a hundred 
miles, and Seward is an open port the year around, so that 



Rich IVDneral Resources of the Territory 281 

coal can be delivered to tidewater here at any time. 

The Bering River coal fields lie to the eastward of 
Cordova near Controller Bay. This bay has not good 
harbor facilities owing to shallowness, else these coal 
fields would be within twenty-five miles of tidewater. 
But they are only from seventy-five to one hundred miles 
from Cordova by rail and thirty-eight miles of road is 
already constructed. 

The coal in both the Matanuska and Bering River fields 
is a high grade coking coal with some anthracite. A test 
of the bituminous coal of the Matanuska field for naval 
use was made and the report was that it was a very firable 
coal easy to burn, the volatile matter appearing to be fairly 
easy to drive ofif. The smoke was somewhat less in den- 
sity than that of Pocahontas and not as black. The stokers, 
on being questioned, said it was the easiest twenty-knot 
run they had ever made. These bituminous coals are said 
to be of better quality than any found on the Pacific coast 
and are of special value for the bunker trade. As there is 
a scarcity of coking coal on the Pacific coast, this coal 
when mined will undoubtedly find a ready market and will 
not only mean a profitable industry for Alaska but a great 
help to the industries of the Pacific States. Its only 
competitor is the bituminous coal of Vancouver Island, 
but this is of inferior quality to the Matanuska and Bering 
River coal and so will not seriously affect its sale. 

In both the Matanuska and Bering River fields there 
is some anthracite. But it is more or less crushed and does 
not produce a large percentage of lump coal. But there 
is practically no anthracite on the Pacific coast and the 
possibility of getting hard coal, even though not of the 
best quality, at the cost at which Alaska can produce it 
as compared with the cost of the eastern product, will 
find it a market. 



282 Alaska, Our 



The coal of the Nenana fields is lignite. This is not a 
coking coal but it is an excellent coal for domestic use. 
In fact, householders prefer it to bituminous, it is so clean. 
It can be handled without leaving any more trace of soil 
upon the hands than would glass. It will greatly reduce 
the cost of mining throughout the interior of Alaska and 
permit the working of low grade ores now undeveloped. 
Many other industries dependent upon cheap fuel will 
spring to life as soon as the mining and transportation of 
this lignite is under way. These Nenana fields are near 
the route of the government railroad and not far from 
Fairbanks and their opening means the prosperous de- 
velopment of all this section. 

These coal fields are incredibly rich. By actual 
measurement of the United States Geological Survey 
seven veins have been reported, one above another, 
giving a thickness of two hundred and eighty-six feet. 
Others range from one to forty feet, and a careful sum- 
mary estimates the coal in these fields as close to ten 
l^illion tons. It is easy to see what the placing of this coal 
upon the market will mean to the development of the rich 
resources of interior Alaska which are only waiting for 
transportation and cheap fuel. 

But these three sections are merely the ones that have 
been most thoroughly surveyed because two of them are 
near the government railroad and the other, the Bering 
River field, is close to the Copper River railroad. But 
many other parts of Alaska are known to have their coal 
deposits, and when carefully investigated may likewise 
prove rich. 

On the Kenai Peninsula coal has long been known to 
exist. In fact, a coal mine was worked here by Russians 
in the early days and later by a company of Russians and 
Americans. The geological maps indicate a larger area 



Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 283 



than in any other part of the Territory, but Httle informa- 
tion is yet obtainable in regard to other data about it. 
Coal washes up on the beach of the peninsula in some 
places in quite sufficient quantities for the needs of those 
living there, and salmon canneries and fishing vessels get 
supplies in the neighborhood for their needs. It is re- 
ported by those who know the coast that in some places 
great ledges of coal are to be found in the bluffs and that 
one could secure all he needed from these ledges if an 
easier method of getting it were not already provided by 
the quantity washed up on the beach. As these deposits 
are on tidewater, shipping would be easier and less ex- 
pensive than from the interior. 

Coal has been found in the Seward Peninsula, as far 
north as the Arctic, in the country north of the Yukon and 
in the Kuskokwim country. In the Seward Peninsula a 
vein of coal one hundred feet wide has been discovered 
and probably there are equally rich finds yet undiscovered. 
It is believed by many that Seward Peninsula has enough 
coal for local use. Next to transportation, if not indeed 
equalling it, cheap fuel is the Seward Peninsula's greatest 
need. There is no timber worth the name in this section 
with the exception of the Council district, where there is 
some small spruce. All fuel must be brought in from the 
outside. When government regulations put the mining of 
coal on a more practical basis, the deposits in Seward 
Peninsula will be of great help in developing this section. 

Another rich deposit of Alaska is tin. There are prac- 
tically no tin mines in our country, yet the United States 
uses between forty and fifty per cent of the world's output 
of tin, so that the discovery of tin in Alaska brings 
another valuable asset to the country. The Alaska tin is 
said to assay higher than English tin and the deposits are 
claimed to be greater. 



284 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

The metal has been found in the Seward Peninsula, 
near Fairbanks and in the neighborhood of Circle City. 
The Seward Peninsula is said to have the richest deposits. 
In one claim alone the quantity of tin ore in sight is valued 
at $2,000,000. The chief deposits are in the York dis- 
trict, which is to the northwest of Nome on the coast of 
Bering Sea. This is a bleak, inhospitable region difficult 
of access for the necessary machinery for tin mining, but 
the determination and endurance of the Alaskan prospec- 
tor are no better shown than by his conquering of the 
obstacles that here confront him. 

The York Mountains, which are steep with sharp 
ridges and also bare of vegetation, bound the region on 
the east and the Cape Mountains on the west. Between 
lies the York Plateau, a tableland which is in reality an 
old marine bench. To the north, along the Arctic shore, 
stretches a broad, low tundra with many sand spits and 
lagoons on the coast and innumerable ponds scattered over 
the boggy lowland. It is not an inviting country and life 
here has few attractions, but despite hardships and diffi- 
culties tin mining is going forward. A few dredges are 
working, and hand and horse scraping and drag shovels 
are being used. It is more costly and more difficult to get 
supplies and machinery in here than at Nome for they 
must be transshipped at Nome to coast steamers. Then, 
when landed on this far northern, bleak coast, they must 
often be hauled by freight teams or poled in boats to their 
ultimate destination. It is costly to keep horses in this 
part of the world and the work of poling is laborious and 
slow. Consequently though there is a great need of tin 
and our country has little, these valuable deposits are not 
much worked. 

Comparatively little is being done with the tin in the 
vicinity of Fairbanks, and nothing whatever with that 




< 

a 
J 



Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 285 

discovered near Circle City. These deposits are wait- 
ing for better transportation and cheaper fuel to be 
developed. 

Marble is one of the deposits of Alaska that is coming 
to the fore, both for quality and quantity. Not only is a 
fine grade of white marble found but deposits have been 
found that have delicate tintings of lavender, a faint yel- 
low, green and other tones. These lend themselves de- 
lightfully to unusual artistic effects in decoration and for 
this reason the Alaska marbles arc winning high recog- 
nition among builders. They are used now liberally in 
all the buildings on the western coast from Seattle on the 
north to San Diego on the south, and their fame is pene- 
trating eastward to the large cities of the interior. 

So far, the principal deposits are found in the south- 
eastern section, chiefly on the Prince of Wales Island. 
Here several marble quarries have been opened, one of 
them being owned by a Vermont company with very 
extensive quarries in Vermont and other States and works 
at Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Chicago, 
St. Louis, Dallas, San Francisco, Tacoma, Ontario and 
other places. The marble mined in these quarries re- 
sembles the Carrara marble, nothing superior to it being 
found in America. 

Petroleum is another product of Alaska, but to just 
what extent it occurs is little known. All of Alaska's oil 
lands were withdrawn in 1910, with the exception of one 
small tract on which title had already been secured, and 
so of course all work in regard to this product has been 
stopped. The oil so far discovered is a refining oil similar 
to that of Pennsylvania with a paraffin base and but little 
sulphur, the type of oil more and more in demand as gas- 
oline is a product of it. When Congress takes some step 
to throw these lands open the oil industry of Alaska will 



286 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

become an important factor in the business enterprises of 
the Territory. 

The oil seepages at present known are at Katalla, on 
Controller Bay; at Yakataga, to the east of Katalla; on 
Cook Inlet and on the Alaska Peninsula. All these are on 
the Pacific seaboard, which makes their development easy. 
Some seepages have been discovered on the Arctic coast 
but little is known of these. 

The oil at Katalla is said to have been discovered by 
a member of a party on a bear hunt. Alaskans had heard 
stories from the Indians of strange black pools in this 
section but had paid little attention to them. This bear 
hunter, however, while after his game came near falling 
into a puddle of thick, black fluid, the surface of which 
was partially dried. He took some of it back to camp 
and tried it for building fires. A year later when in the 
same district he found a little spring of petroleum. He 
threw a match into it and a gusher of fire flamed out that 
set the whole country into a blaze and burned for a week. 

These Katalla fields are about twenty-five miles long 
and from four to eight miles wide and skirt the north 
shore of Controller Bay. The field lies in part on the 
southern slope of a densely timbered highland whose sum- 
mits reach from twelve hundred to two thousand feet 
above the sea, and also in part on the flats adjacent to the 
shore line. 

Katalla is a small settlement at which freight can be 
landed from scows only during favorable weather con- 
ditions. But as this is also the region of the Bering River 
coal fields and as a railroad will undoubtedly in the course 
of time be run into them, it could be made to serve also 
the oil fields. Pipe lines could also be run to tidewater as 
there is plenty of timber available for structural purposes. 

A small tract had been patented in the Katalla field 



Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 287 

previous to the withdrawal of Alaska oil lands and this is 
being worked in a small way. This is the only oil pro- 
duction in Alaska at present (1918). This could be 
worked to better advantage were the field developed gen- 
erally and transportation and other business facilities 
thereby improved. 

In the Yakataga field, some eighty miles east of Katalla, 
the oil zone is about twenty miles long and from a half 
mile to two miles inland from the coast. A strong oil 
seepage has also been found about fifteen miles to the 
eastward. The Yakataga seepages are mostly in a series 
of short valleys separated from the coast by a low, wooded 
ridge. 

The seepages on Cook Inlet are on the west shore about 
parallel with Iliamna Lake and are accessible from good 
harbors both north and south. South of them on the 
Alaska Peninsula in about the latitude of Kodiak Island 
are other seepages which were known even in the times 
of the Russians. 

Owing to the fact that all these oil fields have been 
withdrawn little accurate data is available. But the oil 
is here — that is assured — and, without doubt, in the 
course of time restrictions will be lifted and it will be 
developed. 

Chrome ore, used in the manufacture of steel, has re- 
cently been discovered and is being mined. This is a val- 
uable discovery for the Pacific coast, because if steel could 
be made there it would mean not only a great industrial 
development which the coast needs but a reduction in cost 
of many important necessities. This ore is found on the 
Kenai Peninsula and also in the interior in the region 
between the Yukon and the Tanana Rivers. That of the 
interior is not being mined on account of the cost of oper- 
ations but that on the Kenai Peninsula is mostly on tide- 



288 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

water and can be profitably worked. The ore bodies here 
range in thickness from a few inches to about twenty 
feet and some of it averages fifty per cent chromic oxide. 

Cinnabar has been found in the Kuskokwim country, a 
bluff in which are deposits of it extending along the Kus- 
kokwim River for quite a distance. 

Platinum has been discovered in small quantities in 
various places in Alaska, but as it is a metal not easily 
recognized by the average prospector, and not one that 
he has been on the watch for, there may be more of it in 
Alaska than is supposed. So far, it has been found in sev- 
eral localities in the Seward Peninsula, in the Copper 
River section, in the Kuskokwim country, on the Kenai 
Peninsula, and the Prince of Wales Island. These dis- 
coveries show a distribution running northwest and 
southeast and dipping south throughout almost the area 
of Alaska. As the tract north of the Yukon has been 
little explored and chiefly by those who probably would 
not recognize platinum, it may yet be found there. At 
present Russia is the principal producer of platinum, and 
the discovery of it in marketable quantities in Alaska 
would be of great value to the industrial world. Its pres- 
ent high value, about twice that of gold, has led to a care- 
ful search for it in Alaska and the announcement of 
important discoveries may come at any time. Late geo- 
logical maps of the Kuskokwim country show a belt of 
rocks of the same age geologically as those which yield 
platinum in Russia, and as it is in this section of the Kus- 
kokwim that specimens have been found in the sluice 
boxes of the gold miners there may be here valuable 
deposits awaiting only the eye of the experienced mineral- 
ogist. 

There are, however, few minerals that are not to be 
found in Alaska. Antimony is being mined, but as it has 



Rich Mineral Resources of the Territory 289 

to be hauled by wagon to a small railroad which takes it 
to the nearest camp, or else by dog sled in winter, and 
thence by boat to the outside, its mining does not go for- 
ward very fast. 

Tungsten has been discovered and is being mined and 
shipped out by parcel post. One thing must be said to 
the credit of the miners in Alaska. They seldom let diffi- 
culties get the better of them. By ingenuity, resourceful- 
ness, or sheer grit, they put their products over. 

Sulphur, lead, nickel, cobalt, silver, bismuth, molyb- 
denum, graphite, barytes, have all been found and are 
being worked to some extent. The deposit of barytes is 
quite large and exceptionally pure. It is located on tide- 
water and can be easily developed. Heretofore the barytes 
used on the Pacific coast has come from the East and 
from abroad, but this deposit in Alaska promises to meet 
all future needs. 

The Bureau of Mines at Fairbanks, and the establish- 
ment of a School of Mines there in connection with the 
Agricultural College, is of inestimable help to the devel- 
opment of Alaska's mineral resources. 

The Bureau renders valuable assistance both to pro- 
spectors and those already engaged in mining. It makes 
qualitative analysis of specimens to enable the prospector 
to know promptly the kind of material that may be present 
in any specimen he may find. It collects data as to the 
mining and mineral possibilities of the Territory. It sup- 
plies information of the market price for ores and min- 
erals. It has available for study a collection of minerals 
of economic importance and it maintains a reading-room 
and a library of mining books and periodicals. 

Prospectors can send rock specimens from any part of 
the Territory to the Bureau and it will make tests to de- 
termine the kind of metal or minerals in them. No charge 



290 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

is made for this service but it is desired that specimens 
brought or sent be accompanied by as much information 
as possible regarding the locahty where found, the near- 
ness to transportation, and whether the specimen is float 
or from a prospect hole or claim. In the latter case, the 
approximate amount or extent of mining operations such 
as shafts, tunnels or raises should be furnished, together 
with the size of the vein, the distance the ledge can be 
traced, an estimate of the approximate quantity of ore in 
sight and any other useful information of a general char- 
acter. 

When possible, prospects or mines from which speci- 
mens have been analyzed are examined by members of the 
Bureau when on their field trips, and by having this in- 
formation available for operators or companies interested 
in exploratory work or searching for new properties, it 
makes it possible for the man with a small mine or pros- 
pect and the man or company with capital to come to- 
gether. It is well known that the cost of sending an 
engineer from the States is so great as not to warrant it 
except for well-developed and promising prospects, but 
it is hoped that this work of the Bureau will, to a certain 
extent, take the place of a preliminary examination and 
furnish data in many cases to justify the trip of an engi- 
neer where it might not otherwise be thought of. 

At the office of the Bureau in Fairbanks is a collection 
of more than a hundred minerals known to be or likely to 
be found in Alaska. This offers the prospector an oppor- 
tunity to learn the appearance of some of the more un- 
common minerals so that he may be on the lookout for 
them when in the field. The library contains a complete 
file of the bulletins of the United States Bureau of Mines 
to date, a number of publications of the United States 
Geological Survey, many books on mining, ore dressing 



Rich Blineral Resources of the Territory 291 

and kindred subjects, and useful information from the 
catalogues issued by the manufacturers of mining machin- 
ery. In the metallurgical laboratory is a full equipment 
of the most modern machinery for making milHng tests 
of practically every kind of mineral likely to be found in 
Alaska. 

The Bureau cooperates with any miner who is erecting 
a new mill or making changes in his present one, with a 
view to helping him increase its efficiency, and will also 
make a test run of his ore. No charge is made for this 
work. 

The Bureau also makes special investigations looking 
toward the saving of by-products in placer work, partic- 
ularly the fine gold and the values contained in the con- 
centrate sands in the shape of tin, tungsten and platinum. 
Side by side with these studies are investigations in the 
cost of placer mining, the utilization of various methods 
of handling gravel, the study of methods and cost of 
thawing ground. 

The members of the Bureau also visit various mining 
camps not only in the vicinity of Fairbanks but through- 
out the entire Territory to familiarize themselves at first 
hand with mining conditions and problems in Alaska. 
The work of the Bureau is for the whole Territory, Fair- 
banks being chosen as headquarters merely because of its 
central location and of its nearness to the railroad. 

The establishment of the present station is due largely 
to the efforts of Mr. Joseph Holmes, a man of construc- 
tive imagination who was enthusiastic over the mineral 
wealth of Alaska and recommended a mining and metal- 
lurgical laboratory for the assistance of the prospectors 
and miners of the Territory. Dr. Holmes worked ener- 
getically upon the plans for the Bureau until his death, 
which was caused by exposure on a reconnaissance trip. 



292 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

His dreams and sacrifice have given the spirit to the Bu- 
reau and it is carried on with the same eager desire to 
be of help to miners and of assistance in developing the 
mineral resources of the country. 

The School of Mines, which is conducted in connection 
with the Agricultural College, is carried on along the lines 
of other schools of this character, except, of course, that 
special attention is given to Alaska's mineral wealth and 
mining problems. 



CHAPTER XXI 

ALASKANS FISHING INDUSTRIES 

Salmon and the various methods of marketing it. Halibut 
AND COD. Herring in countless numbers. Other commer- 
cial FISH AND by-products. FiSH FOR THE SPORTSMAN. 

The fisheries of Alaska run the minerals a close sec- 
ond in value, if, indeed, they are not already outstripping 
them. The salmon pack alone for the one year 1918 was 
valued at close to $50,000,000. Yet this is but one of 
Alaska's fishing industries, and these industries at pres- 
ent, great as this one alone shows them to be, are scarcely 
started. Only twenty edible fish are being used commer- 
cially out of one hundred and twenty-five known varieties 
that swarm Alaskan waters. With these twenty making 
the showing they do, what the fisheries of Alaska will 
produce when developed to their utmost no one can 
conjecture. 

The fish of Alaska have excited amazement from the 
earliest times. The first navigators of these waters, 
the Russian, Spanish and French, told in the narratives 
of their explorations of the incredible number of fish 
that swarmed the coastal shores and rivers. But as furs 
were the lure of these early explorers little attention was 
paid to the fish. Indeed, when it is considered that only 
twenty out of a choice of one hundred and twenty-five 
are being used, and of these effort is concentrated chiefly 
on one, the salmon, one might say that even to-day, one 
hundred and fifty years after these early explorers noted 
Alaska's fish, little attention is being paid to them. It 

203 



294 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

may have been the reports of the men first in these waters 
however that caused Secretary Seward when drawing 
up the treaty for the purchase of Alaska to make the wise 
provision, " The waters that surround the land are in- 
cluded in the transfer." 

A great continental shelf extends along the coast of 
Alaska that makes a feeding ground for fish unequalled 
in the world. It is estimated that there are two thousand 
square miles of cod banks that one might say are almost 
untouched as compared with the fishing on other known 
cod banks, and, too, these are in a milder, pleasanter 
climate for fishing and there is less hazard from storms 
and icebergs than on the cod banks of the Atlantic. 

Swarms of salmon leaping streams in such quantities 
that they crowd each other out on the shores are common 
stories. The same is true of the herring and the oolichan 
or candlefish. The herring has been reported in some 
places so thick for fifteen miles that windrows of them 
several feet high were piled on the beach dead. Of the 
candlefish, William Dall, director of the scientific corps 
of the Western Union Telegraph Expedition, says, 
" They were so abundant as to almost entirely fill the 
river. It was almost impossible to wade without tread- 
ing upon them and they could be dipped up in large quan- 
tities with dip nets or even baskets." 

At present the salmon ranks first among Alaska's fish, 
and salmon canning is the chief fish industry. " The 
Pacific salmon," says Dr. Hugh Smith of the United 
States Bureau of Fisheries, " are the most valuable fish 
not only in the United States but also of the entire west- 
ern hemisphere. With the single exception of sea her- 
ring, the Pacific salmon are commercially the leading 
fishes of the world. The salmon have, in fact, been 
Alaska's most valuable contribution to the world's needs, 




f 








Alaska's Fishing Industries 295 

exceeding in abundance and importance those of any 
other region." 

There are five species of salmon in the Alaskan waters, 
the King, valuable because of its size, for it is often four 
feet long, and attains a weight of thirty pounds and 
more; the red or sockeye, liked because of its color; the 
humpback or pink, a trifle paler in color than the red; 
the silver, which is smaller than the other varieties, and 
the dog or chum salmon. Unfortunately, a prejudice 
exists against the dog salmon, because the natives feed 
it to their dogs and it is thought by many not to be an 
edible fish. Its color, too, is against it. But it is a 
palatable food fish, and now that its name commercially 
has been changed to grayfish, the prejudice may die 
away. 

In the matter of age the salmon canning industry is 
almost a twin to gold mining, for the first salmon cannery 
was started in 1878 and gold mining at Juneau began 
in 1880. 

Salmon are caught in traps, by trolling, by seines, by 
gill nets and a few by lines and dip nets. They are 
brought to the canneries by the fishermen usually in gas 
launches, for these little boats flit swiftly here and there 
over Alaskan waters in the fishing season like water 
spiders. From the boats the fish are tossed into a con- 
veyor that carries them into the cannery. These convey- 
ors are of various kinds, but frequently they are a long 
trough lined with shining tin and filled with sparkling 
water along which the fish float in silvery beauty until 
they reach a chute down which they slide to mammoth 
bins. These great bins filled with fish, often thousands 
at a time, are impressive sights. 

From these bins the fish are fed into the Iron Chink, 
an almost human piece of machinery that cuts oflF the 



296 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

head, opens and cleans the fish and then sends it on to a 
table where the final cleaning is done. 

This work is by hand, Chinamen or Japs, sometimes 
American women, performing it. The workers wear 
gloves, and, if possible, rubber or waterproof coats or 
aprons, for this is the least pleasant part of the canning 
work. The labor must be done in running water, and as 
this is usually mountain water it is ice cold. A quick 
keen glance shows what needs to be removed, a few 
movements of a sharp knife, a rinsing in the clean water, 
and the fish again goes to a carrier that moves it swiftly 
along to a bin where a boy puts it into a hopper that 
feeds it to a cutting machine. 

This machine cuts the fish into pieces of the right size 
for the cans and then these pieces go on to a machine 
that presses them into the cans. The whole process is 
deft, efficient machine work. The pieces of fish ready 
to be packed move on a carrier in a long line, the empty 
cans move side by side with them on another carrier. 
A piston rams the fish into an empty can, it moves on, 
the next can takes its place, and thus the filling goes on 
with the automatic precision and regularity of clockwork. 
A one-pound can is filled every second. 

The filled cans are picked up by an operator and set 
on a carrier and away they speed to the steam box. 
Any can not full is set off en route by an inspector, filled 
on the spot by a worker with fish and knife and set back 
again. 

The first cooking in this steam sterilizing flume is for 
fifteen minutes. After this the top is clamped on by 
machinery, another swift, automatic process, and then 
the cans are placed on trucks and wheeled to big iron 
retorts where they are cooked an hour and twenty min- 
utes. After this comes the testing to see that each can 



Alaska's Fishing Industries 297 

is correct in weight and air tight, then the shellacking 
to prevent the cans from rusting, and the labelling and 
boxing. In the course of a few weeks or months, these 
cans, with their legend of place and kind and quality, 
stand on grocery shelves ready to serve the public with 
delicious, nourishing food. 

Aside from their machinery, the canneries are not ex- 
pensive establishments. They are usually long, one- 
story buildings quickly and crudely constructed on the 
shore of some inlet or cove or near the wharf of some 
town. When not in a town the woods enclose them, the 
mountains rise steeply behind, and wild flowers and 
waterfalls add to the beauty of the environment. Gulls 
perch in long white rows on the roofs of the buildings 
or swoop down in graceful curves to the waters for the 
food that is being continually washed into it from the 
canneries for them. Small frame buildings or tents pro- 
vide accommodations for the workers, though there is 
not a large working force and this is mostly Japs or 
Chinese. The work is done by machinery with a few 
keen-eyed deft watchers and manipulators of the ma- 
chines and a small force to handle the labelling and pack- 
ing, and a few clerical workers. Sometimes the labelling 
is done elsewhere. 

Salmon are also mild cured, pickled, dried and smoked, 
frozen and shipped fresh. 

In mild curing the fish are split down the middle, the 
head, tail and all fins except the pectorals removed, and 
the backbone cut out. The fish is then cut in halves, 
each of which is scored on the outside eight or nine times 
with the knife. They are then thrown into a cleaning 
vat, and here the inner side of each section is carefully 
scraped clear of blood and membrane with a knife, while 
the outside is thoroughly cleaned with a scrubbing brush. 



298 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

The sections are then laid carefully inner side up in 
another vat partly filled with clear, cold running water 
or into a tierce partly filled with fresh water and cracked 
ice in which they remain for an hour. Formerly the 
fish were put into brine, but it has been found that ice 
water answers the purpose much better. After being 
thoroughly cooled, the sections are salted down in the 
tierces, each one being laid with its tail toward the 
centre. The fish are but lightly salted, and, owing to 
this fact, must be kept in cold storage until used. 

The principal consumers of the mild cured salmon are 
those who smoke salmon, who take them from the tierce, 
wash them for a few moments and then have practically 
a fresh fish to smoke, and not, as in the days when hard 
pickled salmon were used, one that had lost much of its 
oil and flavor through the excessive amount of salt 
needed to preserve it. 

The pickling of salmon is not carried on so extensively 
as formerly because of the increasing popularity of the 
mild cured fish, but it is, nevertheless, one of the perma- 
nent salmon industries of Alaska. A few of the pic- 
kling establishments also pack " bellies." This product 
is merely the bellies of the fish, which is the fattest por- 
tion, and as most of the packers threw away the rest of 
the fish this method has come under the ban of the law. 
As a result, bellies are only packed now when some 
economic use is made of the remainder. At some places 
where these bellies are used the backs are dried in the 
sun and used for fox food. 

The smoking of salmon is virtually a continuation of 
the pickling, as the fish must be pickled before they can 
be smoked. A variation of the smoking process is known 
as kippering. 

A smoked product known as Beleke is put up at Ko- 



Alaska's Fishing Industries 299 

diak. The smoking must be done very slowly, two weeks 
being taken for it and only a small fire being used. On 
dry days the smoking house is partially opened and the 
wind allowed to blow through. There is a good demand 
for Beleke locally, but little effort has been made to 
extend the sale outside of Alaska. 

The shipping of frozen salmon and of fresh salmon in 
crushed ice is also a profitable part of the salmon in- 
dustry. 

Salmon hatcheries are maintained both by the govern- 
ment and by individual canneries as it is recognized that 
the present enormous catch of salmon would soon exter- 
minate them unless the stock is renewed. Two govern- 
ment stations and five private hatcheries are maintained. 
The annual capacity of these hatcheries is approximately 
350,000,000 red salmon eggs, of which the two govern- 
ment stations handle 150,000,000. The private hatch- 
eries are inspected from time to time by representatives 
of the government. 

The work is under constant study and experimentation 
with the idea of improvement. At one station efforts are 
being made to rear the salmon to fingerling size before 
planting. The young fish are fed on raw salt salmon 
ground up after being freshened. The results obtained 
from the use of this food are better than when cooked 
food is given. It is also noted that the young fish thrive 
better in the hatching troughs than in the rearing ponds. 
At another station the adoption of the incision method 
for taking red salmon eggs has been tried and found to 
be an improvement. 

The Fish and Gun Club of Juneau also are making 
efforts along lines of their own in regard to salmon 
propagation. They believe that the closer the natural 
course is followed the better. Aiding nature seems to 



300 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



them preferable to radical departure from such methods, 
and they are experimenting with planting eggs in the 
sand or gravel to conform with natural hatching. They 
are experimenting in several other fields, one of which is 
to see if fish cannot be hatched from eggs now wasted 
under the Iron Chink. So far they have effected a saving 
of five per cent which, if the cost of doing this is not too 
great, is worth while, as otherwise these eggs are abso- 
lutely wasted at present. 

Halibut ranks next to salmon in the fishing industry 
of Alaska. This fine, big, white-meated fish is growing 
more and more in favor and Alaska waters teem with it. 
So numerous are they that at first they were fished for 
simply from wharves. Becoming scarce here they were 
found in quantity in the Inland Passage from Ketchikan 
to Skagway. But the demand increasing, the fishermen 
finally went to the halibut banks, which extend as far west 
as Kodiak. Twenty million pounds a year is a conser- 
vative estimate of the catch. The banks of the Atlantic 
produce less than five million. The Alaska halibut are 
shipped now to many parts of the United States. For 
packing this fish the Alaska halibut fishermen have the 
ice ready at hand in the bergs that break off from the 
glaciers in many of the regions where the fish is to be 
found. 

Cod fishing in Alaska is climbing steadily into impor- 
tance as a business. TJie banks lie off the Aleutian 
Islands and the southern and northern shores of the 
Alaska Peninsula. On these southern shores the cod 
fishing of the Pacific is much pleasanter than the same 
occupation in the Atlantic, for the climatic conditions 
are more favorable. Several new industries are spring- 
ing up in connection with the cod fishing, such as the 
packing of flake codfish and a method of treating and 



Alaska's Fishing Industries 301 

packing similar to the canning of salmon. Both of these 
have proved successful. In the main, however, the fish 
are merely salted and shipped to the States for further 
treatment. 

Herring fishing as an industry may be said to have 
scarcely started. Herring swarm Alaskan waters till 
they suffocate and are found on the shores dead from 
this cause. They are so thick that the Indians catch 
them by means of nails driven through laths with which 
they beat the water and rake them into their boats as 
fast as they can lift the stick. The Alaska herring, too, 
is unusually fat. No lard or grease of any kind is needed 
in its cooking. Yet they are used for little but bait for 
halibut fishing and for oils and fertilizer. 

The herring fisheries of Scotland and Norway yield 
these countries millions of dollars annually. A recent 
report from an American consul in Norway shows that 
in four seasons the catch had an average annual value 
of $6,600,000. The herring resources of Alaska are 
superior to those of Norway, yet the average annual 
value of Alaska's catch is but $252,000. The imports of 
cured herring into the United States are heavy, yet fish 
the equal, if not of a better quality, swarm Alaskan 
waters, and it is reasonable to suppose could be put on 
the market for less than the imported variety. 

A few are awaking to the possibilities of this industry. 
Norwegian capitalists have already established a big 
plant in one section and several other firms have started 
the Scotch method of curing herring, and their products 
are finding a ready market and commanding higher prices 
than other herring. By the Scotch method the fish are 
more carefully selected and more thoroughly cleaned. 
They are packed more carefully, are not repacked, and 
they have very little pickle on them. 



302 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Kippered herring as a canned article is also one of the 
new products of the Alaska fisheries. The herring when 
delivered at the cannery are spread on the floor in a thin 
layer and sprinkled with salt, where they remain until 
such time as the cannery workers are ready to clean them. 
The fish are then placed on tables around which are gath- 
ered women who dress them. After being cleaned, they 
are immersed for a short time in a salt solution. The 
herring are then taken to the smoking-room and hung 
by the tails on sticks studded on both sides with rows of 
sharpened nails. These sticks when filled with fish are 
placed side by side and tier above tier in the smoke house 
where they are exposed to alderwood smoke over night. 
During this process all surplus moisture drains from the 
body cavity and surface of the fish and the natural oil 
commences to appear. While in this condition they are 
packed by hand in cans. The cans are then sealed and 
cooked for about two hours in boiling water heated by 
steam. 

Another fish that will come to its own in time, though 
as yet it is little known, is the oolichan, eulachon or ulikon 
as it is variously spelled, or the candlefish as it is pop- 
ularly called. It is one of the most delicious small fish 
that swim the sea. It is a silver fish resembling a 
smelt, and is tender and fat. In fact, it is one of the 
fattest of all known fish. The amount of fat in it is so 
great that it cannot be kept in alcohol for scientific pur- 
poses. It is the oil in it that has made it such a popular 
fish with the Indians. They made quite a ceremony of 
catching it in the olden times. The chief fishing grounds 
then for these fish were on the Nasse River in British 
Columbia, and many tribes came hither for the fishing. 
The first fish caught was addressed as Chief and certain 
ceremonies were gone through in his honor. Then the 



Alaska's Fishing Industries 303 

regular fishing began. The fish were caught in a sort 
of wicker basket. The oil was extracted and used for 
food somewhat as we use butter. The fish, when dried, 
were also used for lighting purposes. Sometimes a wick 
was stuck in, sometimes the fish was merely fastened in 
a standing position and lighted. So full of oil is it that 
it burns with a steady light and serves the purpose of a 
lamp or candle. 

These fish crowd the waters as thickly as do the her- 
ring. " The water when filled with them looks as if it 
were boiling," says one traveller who has seen them. In 
an hour or so a woman living near Skagway tossed with 
her hands out of a small stream on her place enough to 
fill a large barrel. 

At present they are not used commercially, except in 
a purely local way by restaurants and hotels and by some 
of the steamers on the Alaska run. But the person who 
puts these fish on the market either fresh, smoked or 
tinned will not only reap a rich harvest but will have 
blessings called down upon him by all fish lovers. 

The Atka mackerel is another fish not yet known 
commercially. It swarms through the passes of the 
Aleutian Islands, where the natives go out in boats and 
fish for it with a long pole on which is a hook. One 
native anchors the boat by holding on to pieces of kelp 
and the other catches the fish. So numerous are they 
that a boat load can be secured even in this primitive way 
in a few hours. 

Whaling is now done almost altogether from shore 
stations by means of swift vessels driven by powerful 
engines. The killing is done by guns mounted on the 
bow. Compared with this industry in the early days, 
however, the returns to-day are small. The whalers of 
New England were the great hunters. They came in the 



304 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

early '40's and nearly exterminated this giant cetacean 
from the waters round about the Aleutian Islands, Then 
they penetrated the Arctic. As many as six hundred 
whaling vessels have been in these northern waters at 
one time. In these early days the whale was killed with 
the harpoon and the capture of one was exciting sport. 
The Aleuts hunted them in their skin boats and killed 
them with ivory-headed spears, which proves the skill 
of these natives both as boatmen and spearmen. 

Whale oil is always in demand commercially, the skin 
is now being used, and glue and fertilizer are among the 
by-products, so that whaling is by no means an unprof- 
itable industry even though it is not so extensively car- 
ried on as formerly. 

During the war the beluga or white whale, as it is 
called, was brought forward as a source of meat supply. 
Those who tried it said it was tender, nutritious, without 
fishy flavor and had very little waste. It needs to be 
camouflaged with a more attractive name, for whale 
steaks do not sound appetizing. But, despite this 
handicap, it may in time become one of our sources of 
food supply. An experienced sea captain of Nome who 
knows this fish well says of it, " Each fish contains a 
thousand pounds of meat, a barrel and a half of oil, and 
has a hide convertible into the finest leather in the world. 
It lives upon smaller fish and abounds in the waters off 
Alaska. Although the beluga is from twelve to sixteen 
feet in length, it can be caught in nets. It is easily 
salted or canned." 

The walrus is valuable for its ivory tusks, its hide, and 
it, too, has been suggested as a source of meat supply. 
It abounds in northern Alaskan waters and the Eskimos 
have always utilized it. 

Other fishing industries are in their initial stages of 



Alaska's Fishing Industries 305 

development. An enormous amount of shellfish is to be 
found along the Alaskan coast, and the canning of clams, 
shrimps and crab meat is starting. The clams in the 
vicinity of Cordova are unsurpassed for quality and beds 
covering an area of approximately thirty square miles 
are to be found in this region. Canneries have started 
here and this promises to become one of Alaska's suc- 
cessful industries. 

The clams are removed from the shells by immersing 
them in boiling water either in vats especially designed to 
receive the wire baskets in which the clams are placed or 
by passing the clams through the water on an endless 
belt. After remaining in the water several minutes the 
clams are thrown on a table and the shells fall away from 
the meat. The clams are then passed on to workers who 
open the stomachs and necks, remove the sand and sed- 
iment therefrom and sever the black part of the neck. 
The cleansing process is continued by placing the meat 
in a cylindrical perforated washing machine. Any sedi- 
ment that may have remained after the hand operations 
were completed is thus removed. The clams are now 
ready to be canned and are taken directly to the filling 
tables if whole clams are to be packed, or to the grinder 
if the clams are to be minced. The cans are filled by 
hand with both meat and juice, after which they pass 
through the topping and sealing machines. The process 
is completed by cooking in retorts. 

Crabs of excellent quality are found in many places, 
but so far have been used almost wholly to supply local 
demands. Some shipments of crabs have been made to 
Seattle, and, no doubt, before long this industry will be 
developed extensively. 

Extensive deposits of mussels are to be found in the 
waters of Alaska. Mussels are used as extensively in 



306 Alaska, Our Beautiful Nortliland 

Europe as oysters are in this country and when an Amer- 
ican trade develops in mussels Alaska will afford a prof- 
itable field for this industry. 

The shrimp business is also beginning. Certain waters 
in the southeastern section are known to yield shrimp of 
excellent quality and large size and the utilization of these 
shrimp in various ways has started. 

Mud sharks, which are found in the waters between 
Juneau and Petersburg, are being caught for their skins, 
which are utilized commercially, and for the oil to be 
obtained from the liver. 

Little attention has been given to the utilization of 
fish eggs, though they abound. The Indians have long 
made use of this abundant source of food and dry con- 
siderable quantities of roe, the product being stored for 
winter use, when it is pounded between two stones, im- 
mersed in water, and beaten with spoons into a creamy 
consistency. Or it is boiled with sorrel and different 
dried berries and made into cakes. 

Plants have been established at various places for the 
making of fertilizers and feed for chickens and stock 
from some of the waste of the various fishing industries, 
especially from the canneries. All these are minor in- 
dustries however, though they hold promise of develop- 
ment, for the resources upon which they are built are 
almost unlimited. They simply have not received atten- 
tion because it has been focussed upon Alaska's great 
fishing industries, salmon, halibut and cod. 

Anglers find sport that delights them in Alaska's 
streams. Trout in variety are to be found in unlimited 
quantity. The kinds include the Rainbow, the Dolly 
Varden, the Cut Throat, the Lake, in fact almost every 
known kind. It is said that in the Mt. McKinley country 
trout weighing forty pounds are caught and it is usually 



Alaska's Fishing Industries 307 

the big fish that get away. However, the fish of the 
McKinley region may be trying to live up to their neigh- 
borhood. In the Norton Sound region a cannery has 
been started for trout. 

Pickerel and grayling are plentiful, and in the sea 
waters black sea bass and flounders. In the Kobuk 
region, to the north of Norton Sound, the shee, one of 
the finest fish in the world, is caught. It weighs from 
ten to eighty-five pounds and is caught in winter with a 
hook through the ice and in summer in nets. Its meat is 
as white as that of the halibut and very fat and has a 
delicious flavor. Catfish and whitefish also abound in 
this region. Another fish of these Arctic stretches is 
found in the bogs and ponds of the tundra. It is some- 
what akin to the frog in its habits and freezes up in the 
winter. It is found in the moss, and stories are told 
by prospectors and miners that by thawing the moss the 
fish come to life and thus delicious fresh fish is secured 
by what might be called indoor fishing. 

But even with allowances for the fisherman's imagina- 
tion, the fish story of Alaska is one not to be matched for 
value and abundance elsewhere in the same area. And 
when the fishing industries of these waters reach their 
maximum development the tale will truly be one to 
astound the world. 



CHAPTER XXII 

FURS IN RICHNESS AND VARIETY 

Furs, Alaska's first lure. The sea otter earliest sought. 
The fur seals. Other valuable skins. Fox and other 
fur farming. 

It was the rich, beautiful furs of this great north 
country that first attracted the covetous eyes of the world 
to it. The fish were noted but passed over. The min- 
erals were practically unknown. But the treasures of 
furs that were brought back by the first comers soon 
roused world-wide attention and trappers and traders 
began to pour in, by boat around Cape Horn and from 
the shores of Asia from Siberia to India, and across the 
continent from the East. Washington Irving has said 
that two great commercial pursuits were the pioneer pre- 
cursors of civilization on the Western Hemisphere, the 
search for gold and the traffic in peltries. Alaska has 
had both, but the fur trade was the first. And in her 
furs Alaska has been as prodigal as in all her other re- 
sources, and in these early days poured a golden harvest 
into the lap of these pioneer traders. 

The first to gather of it were the Russians, and the 
fur sought in the beginning and harvested so richly was 
the sea otter. The finding of the sea otter in almost 
countless numbers was like the discovery of a new gold 
field. The skins were bringing almost fabulous prices 
in China, and for a time the Russians had the field almost 
to themselves. But the news spread, and by 1792 a 
score or more of vessels, under the flags of many nations, 

308 



Purs in Richness and Variety 309 

were sailing up and down the coast hunting the little 
animal and trading for his skin with the Indians. 

The fur of the otter is a rich, lustrous dark brown or 
black, silvered or frosted with the white tips of longer, 
stiffer hairs. These are removed when the skin is 
dressed, leaving only the thick, soft, downy under fur 
with its deep, shadowy brown-black coloring. These 
skins at times brought from two hundred to five hun- 
dred dollars each in Russia, and when this rich treasure 
house of them was discovered on the shores of Alaska, 
the Aleutian Islands and the islands of Bering Sea, dan- 
ger, hardship, disease and death were intrepidly braved 
to secure a share. If the methods of getting them had 
been more worthy, if less greed had been manifested, 
one could admire this band of fur hunters that sailed 
from the shores of Kamchatka in all kinds of vessels to 
seek their prey. But they were ruthless in their on- 
slaught, cruel to the natives, and in the course of time 
almpst exterminated both the sea otter and the one-time 
happy, light hearted Aleuts. Their descent upon the sea 
otter was a spectacle of rapacious greed and inhumanity. 

The sea otter is a solitary animal and one not easy to 
capture. When in the water it shows but the tip of its 
nose, except when asleep, when it sometimes lies on the 
surface of the waves, or when playing, for then it will lie 
on its back in the water tossing pieces of seaweed from 
one paw to the other or playing with its young. To 
bring forth its young it will go to some solitary rock, 
but at other times it seldoms visits land. It is quick of 
hearing and acute of smell. 

When hunting it the Aleuts paddled out in their light 
graceful skin boats to those parts of the near-by waters 
which the sea otter most frequented. Here they noise- 
lessly formed a line, the boats gliding over the water 



310 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

like shadows, for at the least sound the otter disappeared. 
When a little nose w^-s seen sticking out of the water, 
the Aleut who saw it hurled a dart, at the same time ele- 
vating his paddle as a signal to the other hunters. Imme- 
diately the end of the line closed in to form a circle, each 
hunter watching keenly for the reappearance of the ani- 
mal. When he came to the surface a dart was again 
thrown, and this operation was continued until the animal 
was captured. The one who threw the first dart obtained 
the skin. 

At present the sea otter is practically exterminated. 
In the course of time it will no doubt come back com- 
mercially and if properly protected then will again make 
its contribution to the beautiful furs of the world. 

This story of ruthless extermination was almost re- 
peated in regard to the fur seals, which are also found 
in these waters. Gerrassim Pribylof discovered these 
animals on the islands which now bear his name in Bering 
Sea to the north of the Aleutian Islands. For a time the 
Russians hunted these as recklessly as the sea otter, but 
the herd became so greatly reduced that finally, after the 
Russian-American Company came into control, the kill- 
ing was restricted. When the United States took over 
Alaska, the islands after a year or so were leased and 
certain restrictions made as to the number of seals killed. 
But the decrease in the herds still continued. Some 
claimed that the decrease was due to indiscriminate kill- 
ing by the leasing companies, that is, that the females and 
" pups " as the young seals are called, were killed. Oth- 
ers maintained that it was due to poaching and open sea 
or pelagic sealing by which the seals when on their way 
north to rookeries or off the islands feeding were killed. 
This pelagic sealing was most destructive. The seals 
were shot from open boats, and as only the head of the 



Furs in Richness and Variety 311 

seal can be seen in the water, females ready to bear young 
were killed, as well as seal mothers, and the pups were 
left to starve, for the seal mother will feed no baby seal 
but her own. Counts made of the dead and starving 
young seals showed that thousands perished in this way. 
It was also wanton slaughter in other ways, for many 
of the seals shot could not be recovered. 

This pelagic sealing was done by Canadians, Japanese 
and Americans in schooners, and even by natives in 
canoes. The matter finally became so serious that the 
government took it up and a treaty was made by which 
pelagic sealing was abolished, and the United States and 
Russia agreed to pay Great Britain and Japan fifteen 
per cent of the product of the land sealing conducted by 
each and the Japanese agreed to pay the United States, 
Great Britain and Russia ten per cent of the revenue of 
the herd under her jurisdiction. The Government also 
took over the islands. The herd and all the business 
connected with its care are now managed by the Govern- 
ment. A further law was passed in 1912 that for five 
years no seals should be killed except what were needed 
as food for the natives, and the surplus of bachelors, as 
the young males are called. A fleet of revenue cutters 
is maintained with headquarters at Dutch Harbor to see 
that these laws are not broken. 

Under this careful constructive management the herd 
is increasing and in the course of time will return to the 
numbers that made it such a source of wealth to the Rus- 
sians in the early days. Even with all this reckless de- 
struction and mismanagement it has returned to the 
Government since the purchase considerably more than 
ten millions dollars and this has more than paid the cost 
of Alaska. 

The Pribilof Islands are the summer home of the seals. 



312 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Just where is their winter resort is not definitely known. 
But early in the spring they are found in the Pacific 
headed toward Bering Sea and from the middle of June 
to the early part of July they arrive at the rookeries, 
where for the next four or five months they make their 
home and bear their young. The rocks of these islands 
which the seals have scrambled over for years are worn 
smooth and polished and the sound of their barking can 
be heard for miles out to sea. There are three cries, 
when angry a bellow like a calf, when calling to each 
other a milder cry, and when tired and hot a piping 
whistle. They come in herds of thousands to these 
islands, and the rocks and hills are black with their 
numbers. Their food is the fish to be found in the 
waters thereabouts. The lines of the body of the seal 
are soft and flowing and their movement is described 
as like that of a man in a bag. 

The male seal is polygamous and maintains a harem, 
and many bloody battles take place as to whom shall 
dominate the harem, or by some lonely bachelor seal 
making a raid and endeavoring to start a harem of his 
own. There is always a large number of these bachelor 
seals, and it is these that furnish the skins for com- 
merce. Females and pups are not permitted to be 
slaughtered. 

When a killing is to be made several hundred are sep- 
arated from the main herd and driven slowly into the 
interior of the island. As a rule, the seals are timid 
and follow each other like sheep, so that if quietly and 
gently done this separation is not a difficult matter. Thev 
must be driven slowly, for they soon tire, and when tired 
they cannot be made to proceed. Those that tire and 
refuse to go on are killed and skinned at once. 

The killing is done with a club. The animal is struck 



Furs in Richness and Variety 313 

on the back of the head where the skull is thin and then 
while unconscious stabbed in the heart and bled. The 
skin is separated from the blubber by a few dexterous 
movements of a long sharp knife. As seal skins will 
spoil in a few hours, they are taken at once when skinned 
to salting houses, laid out flat, one skin upon another, in 
bins or on benches, the salt being spread thickly over 
each pelt. They remain in these salt bins for two weeks, 
when they are taken out and rolled pelt to pelt in bundles 
of two skins each, strongly corded and packed in casks 
of from forty to fifty skins each and shipped. The skins 
when received in the States are sold at auction and the 
money deposited in the Treasury. At one time the Aleuts 
were paid only ten cents a skin. 

The sea otter and the fur seal were the first fur-bearing 
animals of Alaska to attract attention, but the country 
is rich in many others and the Hudson Bay traders that 
came across the country from the east reaped a rich har- 
vest in these. 

Foxes are numerous. The black fox, the most prized 
of all, is now seldom captured wild, but the red, the cross, 
the silver, the blue and the white are caught in quantity. 

The mink is also found abundantly, thirty-two thou- 
sand of these rich, lustrous brown skins being sent to the 
States recently in one year. The fur is soft, dense and 
mixed with long, stiff, glossy hairs. It shades from a 
light yellowish brown in the poorer kinds to a rich choco- 
late color. 

The fur of the wolverine is not sent so much to the 
outside as other skins, for it is used by the natives to trim 
their parkas, especially the hood about the face. This 
fur does not collect on it the ice or frost from the breath 
as other furs do. and it is, therefore, greatly valued for 
wear in the winter by those compelled to travel. 



314 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

The animal itself is heavily and clumsily built, has 
thick, stout limbs and walks with its back arched and 
head and tail low. It has a thick, woolly under fur and 
a top coat of long, coarse hair, in color blackish brown 
with distinct bands of chestnut brown through it. It is so 
voracious it has been termed the glutton. It is sagacious 
and difficult to trap, is a natural born thief and will steal 
and hide articles for which it has no use. It is very 
destructive and will tear to pieces anything it can get 
hold of, even if it has no desire to eat it. Many tales 
are told of the havoc wrought in cabins and caches by 
wolverines, of flour bags rent and the flour tossed about, 
of articles of wearing apparel torn, of everything within 
reach being destroyed if possible. So that the animal is 
sought not only for its especially useful fur for these 
northern latitudes, but to get rid of its destructiveness. 

The lynx is quite numerous and has a soft, rich, thick 
fur, pale in color. The lynx is shy, dwelling in deep 
forests and bush country, where it preys on birds, hares 
and other small animals. The fur is shipped out in great 
quantities. 

The tiny white skin of the ermine or stoat, the only 
true ermine, is among Alaska's fur products. This little 
animal haunts stony places and impenetrable thickets and 
lives on small animals. 

Marten, called by some American sable, is found. 
Muskrat skins are among the big yields. The beaver, 
though at present giving small returns, was in the early 
days very numerous and was the standard of value of the 
Yukon Indians. 

Bear skins are also in demand for robes and rugs, and 
also deer, caribou skins and moosehide for various com- 
mercial purposes. 

In nearly all Alaskan towns, and in many of the road- 



Furs in Richness and Variety 315 

houses on the trails, furs are on exhibition and for sale. 
It is quite worth while to see these skins even if there is 
no intention to purchase, for they are both interesting and 
educational. They are not made up for wear, but are 
just as they come from the hunter or trapper and one 
gets to see some exquisite and beautiful skins. Alaskan 
furs are thick and beautifully colored, and in these collec- 
tions one will come across skins as beautiful in their own 
distinctive way as are jewels, so exquisitely have they 
caught the colorings of the animal's environment. In 
the thick, soft, lustrous fur you see the black and white 
depths of winter woods warmed with the glow of the 
sun, the grayish shadows of snow-swept spaces, the brown 
of dead leaves reddish in the sun's beams. Through 
these colorings you glimpse the haunts of the animals, 
and as these skins are direct from the animal's natural 
habitation, the eye secures a valuable training in recog- 
nizing the genuine in furs. 

The money to be made in furs has induced some to 
take up fur farming. At first the effort was confined to 
fox farming, but now the raising of mink and marten is 
being undertaken. Altogether there are about one hun- 
dred fur farms in the Territory. It is not a business for 
those who want to get rich quickly as the profits at first 
come in slowly. But if a careful study is first made of 
the habits of the animal to be farmed and the work is 
carried on along scientific lines, the business is in time 
productive of a steady income. 

Fox farming was the first work of this kind under- 
taken and the original effort was made on islands, as the 
initial expense is less and the task of caring for the ani- 
mals is easier than when kennels and enclosures have to 
be made. The foxes can roam freely over their island 
home and it is thought that the fur of animals from farms 



316 Alaska, Our Beautiful Nori;hland 

of this character is better than from those where the 
animals are penned up. 

Islands for fox farming can be leased from the gov- 
ernment, and as there is usually plenty of natural food 
on these islands the expense of maintenance is small. 

But, the industry once started, it was taken up on the 
mainland, and now on the Yukon, the Tanana, and in 
many parts of Alaska, fox farming and other fur farm- 
ing is going on. 

When done on the mainland suitable quarters must be 
made. Soil, climate and location should be carefully 
considered when choosing a fox farm. Limestone or 
alkaline soil will make the fur brittle and harsh. It must 
be remembered, too, that a fox delights in scratching and 
digging, but if the dirt is not soft and pliable, his feet 
become sore and this condition will eventually result 
in his death. A forest covering of spruce, fir, pine or 
cedar is desirable. 

The fox ranch may be from half an acre to five acres 
in extent and should be enclosed with a stockade fence 
ten feet high and with an inner wire of the same height 
so arranged that the foxes cannot burrow underneath or 
climb over the top. Kennels should be large and roomy 
and contain dens where foxes can sleep and make their 
nests. If these kennels can be made two stories in height 
so much the better. The lower part should be compact 
and tight and the upper part open at both ends, where the 
foxes can lie in good weather and sleep in the air and 
sun. Foxes need plenty of sunshine and wind to keep 
them in good condition. They must also have plenty of 
runway or they will not fur properly. If kept in re- 
stricted quarters or penned up in small enclosures the 
pelt or hide will be thick and the fur thin. Natural con- 
ditions should be duplicated as far as possible. 



Furs in Richness and Variety 317 

It must be remembered also that wild animals when 
placed in restraint and subjected to unusual sights and 
sounds are nervous. Great care should be taken to avoid 
anything that will startle them. Foxes are especially 
nervous and will go for days with their young in their 
mouth, putting them first in one place and then in another 
until the pups die from exposure and handling. For this 
reason it is not an easy matter to see a fox farm, for the 
owners do not wish any one about. Although the ani- 
mals become somewhat accustomed to their keepers, even 
these men are careful not to disturb them any more than 
is necessary. One farm was seen where the owner had 
built a sort of observation tower on the roof of his own 
house from which he could watch the foxes so that he 
need not go to the corral any more than was absolutely 
necessary. It seems to be a fixed fact that the less the 
animals are disturbed the better. 

Ideas as to the right food vary, for this work is yet 
largely in its experimental stage and fur farmers are 
trying out various things. On the islands the animals 
as a rule secure their own food from the fish and birds 
there, but in the corrals they must be fed. Some farmers 
give a diet consisting almost entirely of fish, in the sum- 
mer smoked salmon or other fish, but no salt food, and 
in the winter fish from which all blood has been removed. 
Other farmers feed fish, bread, milk, eggs, rabbits and 
even poultry. It is generally conceded that a nursing 
mother fox should get plenty of eggs, milk and porridge. 

The hope for increased profits in fox farming lies in 
improving the stock by selective breeding, so the farmer 
should retain the darkest and most valuable animals and 
sell only the poorer ones. There is a temptation not to 
do this, as the finer skins bring more money, but it is the 
wisest course until a fine stock is secured. As the black 



318 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

and silver foxes are the most valuable, these are the ones 
receiving the most attention, but the other varieties are 
also bred. 

Uncle Sam is himself in the business and on the 
Pribilof Islands foxes are being raised and the skins 
shipped annually for auction in the States. Only two 
kinds are being bred, the white and the blue. On St. 
George Island the foxes are caught in a large box trap 
and those which should not be killed can be released. 
But on St. Paul Island the foxes cannot be trapped and 
no selection can be made of those to be killed. 

Mink farming is not so far advanced as fox farming, 
but some Alaskans have undertaken it with good results. 
It is hardly possible to tame an adult wild mink, but 
young mink can be domesticated. By nature mink are 
solitary wandering animals and they cannot be reared suc- 
cessfully in captivity if large numbers are kept together. 
Their enclosures should be large and as far as possible 
like those of their wild state. 

Where artificial corrals must be made the pens should 
be five or six feet square, the sides of smooth, wide board 
cut four feet long and set up with the lower end resting 
on a footing of stone or concrete eighteen inches in the 
ground. The floor of the pen should be the bare ground. 
The pens can be built economically in groups of four or 
more. The sides can be of heavy wire netting instead 
of boards, but in that case the top would need to be netted 
or the animals would climb out. Boxes about two feet 
by a foot and a half should be provided for nests. They 
should have hinged lids so they can be opened and exam- 
ined and be provided with straw or hay. The boxes may 
be outside the pens bolted to the fence and about three or 
four inches above the ground. The boxes should be as 
dark as possible. 



Furs in Richness and Variety 319 

Some mink farmers say that the best steady food for 
minks is bread and sweet milk, corn mush and milk, or 
corn mush cooked with bits of meat in it. The animals 
should have meat or fish about twice a week. The feed- 
ing pans should be kept clean and the animals fed only 
as much as they will eat at each meal. The animals 
should have but one meal a day except those that are 
suckling young. The food should not be salted. 

Other ranchers believe the mink should be given only 
meat and fish. All these matters are really yet subjects 
for study and experimentation. The real secret of suc- 
cess for any kind of fur farming is a genuine love of 
animals, which will lead to a thorough study of their 
habits and a conscientious care of them. 



CHAPTER XXIII 

THE AGRICULTURAL POSSIBILITIES OF THE TERRITORY 

Farming in Russian times. Miners as farmers. Govern- 
ment INTEREST AND ESTABLISHMENT OF EXPERIMENTAL STATIONS. 

What can be grown in this Northland. The agricultural 

COLLEGE. 

Agriculture is one of Alaska's resources about which 
there is without doubt the greatest ignorance and the 
strongest prejudice. The gold of Alaska the world has 
heard of. Furs are expected from a cold country. 
Knowledge of its fisheries is beginning to penetrate. 
But agriculture in an Arctic region ? Impossible. And 
the assumption is dismissed with a feeling of pity for the 
person harboring such a delusion. Even when barley and 
wheat four and five feet high are shown, turnips weigh- 
ing twenty-one pounds, strawberries of a delicate flavor 
unknown in the States, and celery crisper and more deli- 
cious than the famous output of Michigan, are produced, 
skepticism still prevails and these articles are regarded 
suspiciously as if they were the work of some wizard 
purely for the occasion, and the assertion is still stoutly 
made, " Agriculture will never amount to anything in 
Alaska. How can it when frozen ground is reached 
within a foot or two of the surface? Can you grow things 
on ice?" This last statement is supposed to settle the 
matter. 

It is said that when some of the Russian scientists who 
accompanied the early expeditions returned to Petrograd 
and told of flowers and vegetation growing on the gla- 

320 



Agricultural Possibilities of the Territory 321 

ciers they were looked upon as the precursors of what in 
later years have been politely termed nature fakers and 
that it was only the favor of certain high officials at court 
that prevented their being sent to jail, there to meditate 
as did Columbus, Galileo and others before them, upon 
the unwillingness of the human mind to accept new ideas. 
But as the sage of Denmark has observed, " There are 
more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in 
your philosophy, Horatio," Flowers and vegetation do 
grow on the glaciers in Alaska, and agriculture is not only 
a possibility but an already demonstrated actuality, and 
this despite the fact that much of the soil is frozen within 
a foot or so of the surface. 

To paraphrase a certain well known remark, " Why 
should it be thought so strange a thing to farm in 
Alaska?" Norway and Sweden in the same latitude 
have many farms and support a population of more than 
ten million people. In Norway there are about two hun- 
dred and fifty thousand farms and wheat, rye, barley, 
oats, potatoes and such crops are successfully raised. 
According to recent statistics ten thousand acres of wheat 
yielded two hundred and fifty-five thousand bushels, 
thirty- four thousand acres of rye, seven hundred thousand 
bushels. The potato crop runs from eighteen million to 
thirty milHon bushels. The horses, sheep, goats, swine, 
reindeer and other cattle number in the millions. The 
financial returns from the butter and cheese alone are 
$37,520,000. 

In Sweden half the population support themselves en- 
tirely by agriculture. There are some three hundred and 
fifty-six thousand farms, and in one year nine million 
bushels of wheat were raised, twenty-one million bushels 
of rye, fifteen million bushels of barley, eighty million 
bushels of oats and six hundred and eighty-three million 



322 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

bushels of potatoes. The value of the various crops ran 
up to almost half a billion dollars. 

Yet the Scandinavians in Alaska, and there are many 
of them there, say that the conditions for farming in 
Alaska are better than in their native country and that the 
soil is richer. 

High latitude is not necessarily a bar to farming, as 
these figures show. But in regard to farming in Alaska, 
latitude is not the only factor to be considered. Climate 
plays a far more important part, for the climate of the 
Territory is not the usual climate of this latitude. The 
Japanese current bathes the coast line with warmth and 
moisture, making the climate in this part of Alaska not 
unlike that of some of our southern States, and high 
mountains enclose interior valleys, giving them a tem- 
perature not unlike that of Canada. These things need 
to be remembered as well as latitude when considering 
the agricultural possibilities of the Territory. 

But accomplished results are more to the point than 
climatic or geographical statistics, and agriculture has 
been one of Alaska's industries since the early settle- 
ments of the Russians in 1784 and thereabouts. Despite 
the fact that implements and cattle had to be brought 
across Siberia to the western ocean and then shipped to 
the coast of America, gardens were planted and butter 
and cheese made in Alaska one hundred and fifty years 
ago. Both at Kodiak and Sitka farming and cattle rais- 
ing were part of the occupations of the people. 

When the United States took over the country there 
was no thought of agriculture as one of the industries of 
the Territory. Had any one suggested it, probably a 
lunacy commission would have been promptly suggested 
to sit on him. The Homestead laws were not extended 
to the country for thirty years and then they provided 



Agricultural Possibilities of the Territory 323 

only for homesteading on surveyed lands. As there were 
no surveyed lands the extension was a farce. Ten more 
years passed before the right to homestead unsurveyed 
lands was granted. In Oregon, three years after it was 
made a territory surveys were made, though in some sec- 
tions the survey posts rotted away before settlers came. 
With the discovery of gold in Alaska settlers came with a 
rush, and had there been proper legislation in regard to 
the land no doubt by this time agriculture in Alaska 
would be far more advanced than it is to-day, both to 
the advantage of Alaska and the country at large. 

But despite the ignorance and indifference that held 
back the development of the land, individual settlers here 
and there saw agricultural possibilities, and just as in 
California many who came to mine took up ranching, so 
in Alaska those who failed to find gold started in to raise 
food for those who did, or in other cases supplemented 
their mining with farming. Little farms and truck 
patches began to spring into being in the neighborhood of 
the mining camps and they were found so profitable that 
their owners gave up mining and devoted themselves alto- 
gether to their farms. 

One of the successful farmers at Haines began in this 
way, intending to supplement his mining on a neighbor- 
ing creek with a strawberry patch. " I soon discovered, 
however," he says in discussing his business, " that I 
could make more money out of growing strawberries 
than I could out of my mine and I quit the mining and 
devoted myself to my ranch." He has a prosperous farm, 
and at the Exposition at Seattle in 1909, his strawberries 
took the gold medal over all the exhibits from the Pacific 
coast. 

Many others were like him and reports began to reach 
the government of what was being accomplished. As a 



324 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

result, special agents were sent to see if agriculture in 
Alaska was practicable. Their report showed that there 
was at least one hundred thousand square miles adapted 
to agriculture in some form. It was realized, however, 
that for farming to go forward most successfully it was 
necessary to study the special conditions to be met and 
experiment stations were established in various parts of 
the Territory. Professor C. C. Georgeson, an experienced 
agronomist, was placed in charge with headquarters at 
Sitka. These stations are doing most helpful construc- 
tive work and agriculture in Alaska is now on a basis 
where it should prove successful and profitable. 

Professor Georgeson, who has been called the plant 
wizard of the North, is sanely enthusiastic over the agri- 
cultural possibilities of Alaska. He knows it has a future 
agriculturally in certain lines and these lines he wants to 
bring to their best and fullest expression. He does not 
hold out promises of untold riches to agriculturists nor 
of easy farming. But he does say that if farming is done 
in line with Alaska's limitations it can be made to pay, 
can supply home markets, and be a useful feature in 
Alaska's development. 

Both by early environment and by training. Professor 
Georgeson is well fitted for the problems that confront 
him. He was born in Denmark and was a student of 
agriculture on several large Danish estates. After this 
training he came to America and took a B. S. degree in 
the Michigan State Agricultural College and later taught 
in various state agriculture colleges and in the Imperial 
College of Agriculture in Japan. He is one of the world's 
greatest experts in the cross breeding of plants and he 
has bent his energies and talents to evolving varieties 
suitable to low temperatures. 

He has a corps of trained and enthusiastic helpers who 



Agricultural Possibilities of the Territory 325 

are eager to bring agriculture in Alaska to its best de- 
velopment and who patiently and earnestly study climatic 
and soil conditions in various parts of the Territory and 
experiment with vegetables, fruits and grains to get those 
best adapted to conditions there. 

Stations are established at Sitka, Kodiak, Matanuska, 
Fairbanks and Rampart. The work at Sitka is confined 
principally to experimentation with fruits and vegetables. 
Kodiak is given over chiefly to cattle raising and dairying. 
Fairbanks takes up farming in general, and Rampart is 
devoted chiefly to working out problems for the far 
northern farmer, for Rampart is in the shadow of the 
Arctic Circle. The station at Matanuska has only re- 
cently been established. This is the section of the govern- 
ment railroad and as there are promising agricultural 
possibilities in this region and as it is one that will be 
developed the soonest, both on account of the demand for 
agricultural products and because of the help transporta- 
tion will give, it was thought wise to establish a station 
here to render all assistance possible. 

At Sitka a small acreage is cleared and here the work 
of studying the fruits and vegetables best adapted to 
Alaska goes forward. Perhaps the most famous product 
of this work is a hybrid strawberry that is becoming 
widely known for its delicious flavor but which has a qual- 
ity equally desirable in Alaska, hardihood. To secure 
this strawberry about fifty different plants were taken 
and crossed with the native wild strawberry. From the 
result of this experiment seven thousand plants were 
taken, each with some special characteristic, and experi- 
mented upon until about forty varieties were obtained. 
The berries are large in size and have a peculiarly deli- 
cious spicy flavor reminiscent of the best of the cultivated 
varieties and of the sweet tang of the wild berry, and are 



326 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

hardy enough to stand Alaskan winters. The securing of 
these results was a long and tedious process and required 
infinite patience. But Professor Georgeson and his asso- 
ciates have all the untiring enthusiasm of the scientist and 
no effort is considered too great if it will help produce the 
desired result. 

Experiments have also been made in regard to fruit 
trees, but so far these have not been successful. Cross 
breeding has been done with early, hardy apple trees of 
the northern States and with a native crab-apple, but the 
results are not palatable for eating. Cherry trees do not 
yield well. 

The work at the Kodiak Station is devoted mostly to 
the study of the cattle suitable for Alaska and to dairying. 
Experiments have been made to develop an all-purpose 
cow and also a cow suitable for the coldest interior parts 
of the Territory. Galloway cattle were selected as the 
stock that would best fill all requirements, for the Gallo- 
way cow needs less protection than other breeds, owing to 
the heavy coat of hair that has developed through two 
hundred years and more of outdoor life in the Scotch 
climate. This cow can also stand rough usage, a point 
to be considered with present means of transportation in 
Alaska, and she has no horns, an advantage in crowded 
quarters. The meat and milk are good. It is believed 
from these Galloway cattle a strain can be developed that 
will meet all requirements in Alaska. 

For the most severe parts of the interior a cross be- 
tween the Galloway and the yak is being considered. The 
yak belongs to Thibet, where the winters are severe and 
life strenuous. He is the ox of that country, is a meat 
producer, and grows a coat of hair that will resist ex- 
tremely low temperature. 

At Rampart experiments are made toward evolving 



Agricultural Possibilities of the Territory 327 

the hardiest grains and vegetables in a short season. Bar- 
ley, oats and alfalfa are tested out here as well as some 
vegetables. A special study of soils and fertilizers is also 
made here, as the soil of the Yukon valley is different 
from that of some other parts of Alaska and needs special 
treatment. 

The work at the Fairbanks station is more general in 
character and may be said to be more representative. The 
farm here is quite large and as it is located in what is con- 
sidered Alaska's biggest and richest agricultural section, 
the great Tanana Valley, the work at Fairbanks is adapted 
to meet a large and diversified need. 

The farm lies about six miles from Fairbanks and is 
reached by the Tanana Valley Railroad, now a part of the 
government road, and also by an auto road which affords 
a beautiful ride through tracts of brilliant wild flowers, 
stretches of spicy spruce woods, and, on clear days, with 
views of the distant snow-capped peaks of the McKinley 
Range, against a vividly blue sky. The farm buildings 
stand on a pleasant southern slope with a birch woods 
back of them and a great chain of snow mountains bound- 
ing the horizon in front. 

The work done here is to increase the grains that have 
been produced at Rampart and to demonstrate the feasi- 
bility of farming in Alaska generally. This station en- 
deavors to foresee the problems that await the Alaska 
farmer, to work them out and thus to be ready with prac- 
tical advice and help when the farmer needs it. 

About one hundred acres are under cultivation, de- 
voted to the work of testing and developing various 
grains and vegetables and to raising small crops of those 
that have so far proven the best. The crops raised are 
distributed in small quantities among the farmers of 
Alaska as seed and in some cases sold. The selling of the 



328 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

crops is, however, not a permanent feature of the work. 
Present conditions sometimes make it necessary. It is 
not intended for the experiment stations to enter into 
competition with the settlers and when there are sufficient 
farmers to make this unnecessary it will not be done. 

The farm is a living book in agriculture in which every 
little section is an interesting chapter. In the various 
testing plats for instance the seed from a single head of 
barley or oats or wheat is planted and a stake with all 
necessary information upon it is placed at the head of 
the row. The growth of every little plant in the row is 
carefully watched and when all come to harvest the seed 
of the best is taken. All the data about it are carefully 
recorded and the following year this seed is planted and 
the process is repeated until heads that bear splendidly are 
secured, when possibly an acre plat will be planted with 
this, and if the result is as expected this seed will be dis- 
tributed. This process takes from three to four years and 
requires innumerable and careful records, for the seed of 
each head that is kept and planted must have its statistics. 
When it is remembered that this is done with many va- 
rieties of oats, wheat and barley, that potatoes are studied 
in the same fashion, that experiments in the rotation of 
crops and soil fertilizers are also carried on, it can be seen 
how busy and interesting a place this is. One of these 
experiments that started with a half teacup ful of small 
Russian wheat yielded in the fourth year two hundred and 
sixty-five bushels. Two heads of hulless and beardless 
barley produced by the same process forty-six ounces and 
a handful of Canadian oats resulted in sixty-nine bushels 
to the acre in three years. 

Potato growing in Alaska was not for a time a success 
as the potatoes were watery. The Alaskans refused to 
buy them, preferring to pay the higher cost of outside 



Agricultural Possibilities of the Territory 329 

potatoes. The experiment station took the matter up, 
discovered that potatoes needed to be grown on the hill- 
sides instead of in the valleys, tested out some forty to 
fifty kinds and found seven that were best adapted to the 
conditions to be met, and now potatoes are among the 
most successful and profitable crops. 

Among the other experiments at the station is the 
working out of a system of maintaining soil fertility by 
a rotation of crops instead of sacrificing the land by a 
summer fallow. A short four-year rotation that is appli- 
cable to any farm is being tried, and if it can be recom- 
mended, the result will be passed on to the farmers who 
cannot afford to risk such tests themselves. A minor soil 
experiment is the ploughing under as a green manure of 
clover hay, part being ploughed with the top on and part 
with the top off. 

In addition to the testing plats there are acres of oats, 
wheat, barley, buckwheat, potatoes and such crops, a 
garden where vegetables for the home table are in a 
prosperous condition and many beautiful flowers about 
the house. 

A big root cellar, which is a necessary part of every 
Alaskan farm, is part of the equipment of the station. 
It is forty feet long, sixteen feet wide and seven and a 
half feet high. It is lined with barked poles to prevent 
the soil from caving when it thaws. There is a large ante- 
room in which there is a stove, and in the rear of the 
cellar are ventilators through which circulation can be 
established when the atmosphere is artificially warmed, as 
it is necessary to do when the temperature falls below 
sixty degrees, as it often does in this section. This cellar 
is always plentifully stocked with many varieties of pota- 
toes ready to be sent out to the farmers who may need 
them. 



330 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

As a result of the work done at the experiment stations 
in Alaska, a large, luscious strawberry has been developed, 
it has been proven that raspberries, currants, gooseberries 
and other berries can be cultivated, and that no apple or 
fruit trees so far discovered will stand the climate. A 
number of varieties of good potatoes have been evolved. 
Cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, kale, Brussels sprouts, 
turnips, carrots, swiss chard, celery, lettuce, radishes, are 
all suitable for raising. The Alaska cauliflower is famous. 
It is larger, crisper and better flavored than that grown 
elsewhere. A wheat that will mature in one hundred days 
has been evolved, also a hardy alfalfa, and beardless and 
hulless barley, desirable because barley hay is one of the 
most important crops and bearded barley causes soreness 
in the mouths of stock and even sets up dangerous in- 
flammation. A sturdy strain of cattle that have an all- 
round usefulness is also part of the good results produced. 

These things are the very basis of successful farming 
in Alaska. But those working at Alaska's agricultural 
problems are not stopping here. They want the farmers 
to realize that farming is a three hundred and sixty-five 
day job, not a matter of clearing a little patch of land and 
planting a few potatoes. Mining, fishing and such things 
can occupy them part of the time, or provide channels of 
employment for members of the family. But to make 
farming pay and to get the most out of it, it must be done 
in a workmanlike manner, and this the force at the sta- 
tions are trying to impress upon those taking up farming. 
They are trying to show them that there should be a 
variety of crops, that there should be chickens and some 
cattle, that every family should have a cow or two, hogs, 
sheep, possibly goats, and that all this is possible. Native 
grasses are plentiful. In many places are grass lands in 
valleys suitable for ranching cattle seven months in the 



Agricultural Possibilities of the Territory 331 



year. Hogs can use material otherwise wasted, and field 
peas, barley and potatoes make an excellent food for 
bacon hogs, which is the type needed, and the type experi- 
ments are being made to breed. In fact, everything that 
can forward agricultural development in Alaska, the 
experiment station service is on the alert to do, whether 
it is a matter of producing actual material results or of 
lifting the standards of farming to higher levels. 

The sections most adapted to farming are the Tanana 
Valley, the valleys along the line of the government rail- 
road, the Copper River Valley, the region between the 
Tanana River and the Fortymile River and various sec- 
tions along the coast. 

The region between the Tanana River and the Forty- 
mile is estimated to contain seven hundred and fifty thou- 
sand acres and to be one of the most productive sections 
of Alaska. Kodiak and some of the Aleutian Islands are 
especially suitable for grazing, and here and at various 
coastal sections are to be found the abundant beach 
grasses. These are a coarse, vigorous grass that grows 
along the salt water beaches close enough to the water to 
be inundated only by the highest tides. It attains a height 
of about four feet and has a seed head which somewhat 
resembles wheat. This grass makes excellent silage. 
The settler who can include twenty or thirty acres of this 
grass in his homestead is in luck. The Kuskokwim coun- 
try, when opened up, will make another desirable section 
for agriculture. This region also abounds in native 
grasses, which make excellent fodder in summer and silo 
material in winter. It is im.possible to gauge accurately 
the amount of land suitable for farming, for some sec- 
tions of the Territory have not been thoroughly surveyed. 
But undoubtedly there are millions of acres. It has been 
estimated that the agricultural and grazing area of Alaska 



332 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

is equal to the combined areas of Pennsylvania, Maryland, 
Delaware, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Ver- 
mont, and New Hampshire. 

The land can be taken up by settlers under the Home- 
stead Act, full information about which can be obtained 
from the Department of Agriculture at Washington or 
the Land Office at Juneau. There are already about two 
thousand homesteaders in the Territory. 

Almost all the agricultural land has to be cleared. This 
is an expensive process if labor for the work must be 
hired, as wages in Alaska are high. But it is not hard 
work. The ground is usually burnt over first. The roots 
of the trees are shallow, owing to the frozen subsoil, and 
are easily removed even when not burned. But the burn- 
ing makes the work still easier. It also leaves the soil 
loose and fine, making it easy to work. 

In so large a Territory as Alaska the soil varies greatly. 
In some places it requires special treatment. But these 
problems have been worked out by the government ex- 
periment stations and those in charge are only too glad to 
answer questions and give all the help they can. 

To further agricultural development in Alaska an 
agricultural college has been established. It is located on 
the government experimental farm at Fairbanks. The 
edifice consists of two stories and a basement, the main 
building being so planned that additions can easily be 
made. There are a number of class rooms, a large audi- 
torium, laboratories for physics, chemistry and such 
studies, a library, manual training and domestic science 
department, and all that is essential for a college of this 
character. The Federal government appropriates $50,000 
a year for equipment and the Territorial Legislature has 
appropriated $60,000 for the buildings and pays for the 
upkeep. 



CHAPTER XXIV 

transportation problems 

Travelling facilities few. The Alaska dog and the aid he 
RENDERS. The road commission and its work. The 

GOVERNMENT RAILROAD. Mt. McKiNLEY NATIONAL PaRK. 

The Copper River and Northwestern Railroad and the 
romance of its building. 

The United States government when it first took over 
Alaska had scant reaHzation of the extent or value of the 
territory acquired. For many years little was done for 
the country. A military governor was appointed, a few 
officials were installed here and there and then no further 
thought was given it. Despite Sumner's eloquent plea in 
the Senate, despite such information as Secretary Seward 
and a few others had tried to disseminate, Alaska was 
still considered a barren and uninhabitable region. 

But gradually as prospectors penetrated the country 
and reports filtered back of gold and other minerals being 
found, and especially when the great rush of '98 took 
place, the needs of Alaska in certain directions began to 
be pressed upon the officials at Washington. Among the 
first of these necessities to be brought to the attention of 
legislators was transportation, and it still remains one of 
the biggest problems to be solved. 

The dog was one of the earliest and still is one of the 
big factors in travelling in Alaska. But a country to 
develop to its utmost capacity must get beyond the dog 
stage of transportation. At the best, the amount of 

333 



334 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

freight and supplies that can be hauled by dogs for a 
country as vast as Alaska is negligible. 

But until better means shall come, the Alaskan must 
rely upon his dog, and in the winter travelling by dog 
team is the chief means of getting about in the interior. 
The Alaska dog has an unique and important place in 
Alaskan life. In many sections he is far more prized than 
a horse, and his cost, when of a fine breed, has been equal 
to, if not in some cases higher, than that of the horse. 

The two Alaskan dogs best known are the malamute, 
" maribou," one tourist insisted upon calling them, and the 
husky. There is still a third, called the Siwash or Indian 
dog. But the malamute and husky are the ones chiefly 
used in the dog teams and the ones usually meant when 
Alaskan dogs are spoken of. 

As to the family tree of these dogs there is much differ- 
ence of opinion. Some claim that both have wolfish an- 
cestry, others that there is no wolf blood in them. Those 
who support the wolf theory say that when the dogs are 
puppies their method of drinking water is watched and 
those that show too great a preponderance of wolfish 
nature are killed for fear they will prove dangerous. But 
on several points in regard to the Alaskan dog there is 
much controversy. Some maintain that the story of their 
making a bed in the snow is all myth, while others, some 
of them dog owners, stoutly maintain they have seen 
dogs do it. 

However, these discussions have little real value. Both 
malamute and husky are the Alaskan's good friends and 
haul him and his supplies over the snow wastes in winter 
and patiently become a pack animal in summer if neces- 
sary. 

The malamute is primarily the Eskimo dog. He has a 
thick coat, usually silver gray in color, a graceful, bushy 



Transportation Problems 335 

tail, carried high, a sharp, black nose, prick ears and nar- 
row eyes. He is keen, alert, intelligent looking, a tireless 
worker and willing always to do his share in a fight. His 
feet are tough and clean, and the feet of an Alaskan dog 
are an important part of their anatomy, for they must 
stand travel over ice and snow without getting tender or 
sore. 

The Husky was bred by the Hudson Bay voyageurs 
from dogs of the Indians and a carefully selected strain 
of imported dogs, or else from careful selections of the 
Indian dogs. It is perhaps a trifle larger than the mala- 
mute, both body and legs being larger. But his coat 
looks much the same and he carries his tail in the same 
plume-like fashion. His ears are not so permanently 
pricked. He is more used in the interior. 

The Siwash looks somewhat like a small malamute. 
He is a good worker, but, in the main, is uncared for and 
half starved. 

The Siberian hound has been brought in, and of late 
years there has been interbreeding with collies, setters, 
pointers, Newfoundlands and St. Bernards. 

The food of the Alaska dog is principally fish. But 
some dog owners add cereals to this and tallow or fat in 
some form. In summer the dogs are often boarded at 
dog ranches. These dog ranches can be seen here and 
there along the Yukon and Tanana Rivers. The dogs are 
exceedingly unhappy looking. They are kept tied, and 
as the temperature is apt to be high and they have a thick 
coat, they are most uncomfortable. 

The harness is simply a band that goes around the 
shoulders and over the breast. The dogs are driven both 
tandem and in pairs. The doubling up method is con- 
sidered the better, as when they are tandem ice collects on 
the tails from the breath of the dog behind and becomes 



336 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

quite a weight. This led for a while to the bobbing of 
their tails. But the tail is quite a protection when sleeping 
at night, as the dog curls it over his nose and paws in 
quite a snuggly fashion. The leader is important and 
must be the most intelligent of the team. The dogs are 
trained to obey spoken directions and respond to " mush," 
" gee," and such commands as well as a horse. " Mush," 
corrupted from " marche," used by the French dog 
drivers on the Mackenzie, has become an accepted part of 
the Alaskan's vocabulary. If quick travelling is desired, 
about fifty pounds to a dog is a load, though a dog can 
pull as much as one hundred pounds. From five to seven 
dogs is considered the best team. Those travelling seldom 
ride on the sled but run along with it and jump on and 
off the runners. 

Since the introduction of the reindeer these are now 
used by many for travelling in place of dogs. One can 
ride on the reindeer sleds and the food does not have to be 
carried as with the dogs. But some objection is made to 
the reindeer because they must be herded while feeding 
and also because they cannot stand hard, steady travel day 
in and out merely on moss. An effort is being made to 
train reindeer to eat oats and heavier food that will give 
greater endurance. 

But Alaska needs more than dog and reindeer travelling 
for the development of its countless and varied resources. 
The people need to get about. They need to get supplies 
and machinery in at the lowest possible cost. Good wagon 
roads and railroads are the prime essential. At present 
the people of the interior are served by the White Pass 
and Yukon route over the mountains from Skagway and 
down the river; up the river from St. Michael, the freight 
for this route coming by a long, roundabout journey from 
Seattle and other Pacific ports, or else over trails from 



Transportation Problems 337 

Cordova, Valdez and this section. In the winter the 
Yukon and all Bering Sea ports are closed with ice, 
which leaves only the trail from the coast. Supplies are 
brought in by this route by horse sleighs and when practi- 
cable by automobile and thence sent by dog sleds to camps 
and towns. There is a winter stage route from White 
Horse to Dawson whence miners mush with dogs to out- 
lying camps. But the cost of all such freighting and trav- 
elling is extremely high and greatly retards development. 

When the gold rush of '98 roused the people of the 
States for a brief while to an interest in Alaska, the gov- 
ernment sent an exploring party to report on the advisa- 
bility of a route from the southwest coast to the middle 
and upper parts of the Yukon. A route was selected from 
Valdez to the interior and a trail for a pack train made. 
In 1904 an appropriation was made for a wagon road 
from Valdez to Eagle but no action was taken. Later 
every able-bodied man in the Territory between eighteen 
and fifty years of age was taxed eight dollars and the 
money was expended on roads by a road overseer. But 
this plan did not prove satisfactory and it was abandoned. 
Finally, in 1905, a board of road commissioners composed 
of three army officers was appointed, the work placed in 
charge of the war department and systematic work of a 
permanent nature begun. 

The task confronting the new board was not an easy 
one. The region in which they were to operate was equal 
in area to about one-fifth of the whole United States and 
it had problems in road construction which no other part 
of the country offered. In some places the ground was 
permanently frozen. In others there were numerous 
glacial streams to be reckoned with, and a glacial stream 
has a character all its own and a mood as changeable as 
an April day. Other sections were quagmires through 



838 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

which either a horse or a man, even without a load, could 
pass only with the greatest difficulty. There were as well 
mountain ranges to be traversed, heavy timber and dense 
undergrowth to be met. These latter are of course among 
the usual problems of road building but in this instance 
they were added to the new and unusual. In fact, road 
building in Alaska presented a combination of all the 
hardest problems that can confront the road engineer. 
There were no easy stretches. In addition, the season was 
short and the field of operations far from the base of 
supplies. All materials needed had to be brought a jour- 
ney by water of from one thousand to almost three thou- 
sand miles according to the destination, and this in addi- 
tion to the distance already travelled to the embarkation 
point in the States, usually Seattle. In some instances all 
this equipment had to be transported over high moun- 
tain ranges and in the beginning over unbridged rivers. 
In some places two hundred pounds of horse feed a day 
had to be allowed for the going in and the same amount 
for the coming out, with a thousand pounds addi- 
tional in the spring when there were no grasses for for- 
age. Three pounds had to be carried for every pound 
that was used during the actual working operations. 

Nature's obstacles were, however, not the only diffi- 
culties that confronted the road builders. The money 
appropriated for the work was a certain per cent of the 
Alaska Fund. But the Alaska Fund was an uncertain 
amount and so the commission could not plan its work on 
a definite basis of so much money at a certain time. Such 
uncertainty, especially in regard to work in Alaska where 
preparations must be made long in advance of actual 
operations, is a great handicap. So serious was this that 
the Secretary of War took the matter up with Congress 
and the item was transferred from the Alaska Fund to 



Transportation Problems 339 

specific appropriation. But this is, too, in a way uncer- 
tain, as it is dependent upon the will of Congress and may 
be changed or even dropped at any session. In addition, 
the appropriation is not available until July, the beginning 
of the federal fiscal year, and so the work is held up until 
the best labor has gone elsewhere and two working 
months of an altogether too short season are lost. One 
dollar in May and June is worth two in July. Lack of 
knowledge of Alaskan conditions produces legislation 
of this sort, wastes public money, and holds up the de- 
velopment of the country. 

Despite, however, the problems that confronted the 
commissioners and the uncertainty of the support that 
would be given them, the men took up their duties and 
in the face of almost overwhelming difficulties have con- 
structed and maintained about a thousand miles of wagon 
roads, some six hundred miles of winter sled roads and a 
little more than two thousand miles of trails. In com- 
parison with the size of the Territory this is little and 
shows the tremendous need that still awaits. But when 
one considers the difficulties faced and conquered, the 
scant, uncertain and ill-timed appropriations, it is much. 

The building of wagon roads is the most important and 
most responsible work of the commission. Great judg- 
ment must be exercised in their location, for the future 
must be considered as well as the present. Experience 
and care are required to select a route that will furnish 
a good roadbed as free as possible from landslides, wash- 
outs, winter storms, long, wet side hills, and such acci- 
dents as would destroy quickly all the work done. Often 
these locations must be made hastily if the road is to some 
new camp, and the work finished as soon as possible, in 
order that the road may be of greatest service to the 
miners in getting their machinery and supplies in. 



340 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Over a great part of the Territory the ground from a 
depth of a foot to eighteen inches and three feet is frozen 
and presents many compHcations to the road builder. If 
the frozen soil is gravel, the problem is not so difficult, for 
the moss or turf is cleared ofT and the road graded in the 
usual way. But if the soil is clay, it must be allowed to 
dry out, and if it is tundra the removal of the surface 
covering means, in a short time, a quagmire for horses 
and machinery to flounder and bog in. In the tundra sec- 
tions, it has been found wise to leave the moss and over 
it put a pole or brush corduroy road. 

Even when the ground is not frozen the corduroy is 
sometimes necessary. In the southeastern parts of Alaska 
the soil in some places is a bog. In fact the forests 
through which the roads are built resemble very much 
tropical jungles. The soil is soft, spongy, a mass of vege- 
tation and timber, and after the roadway has been cleared, 
brush, poles, and gravel or heavy soil has to be dumped 
and graded to get firm going. In other places planking 
has to be resorted to. The road up to Silver Bow Basin, 
back of Juneau, is planked on trestles in some places as 
there is no roadbed whatever. All sorts of conditions 
have to be met in road building in Alaska, some of them 
quite new in the records of road construction. 

When the ground is frozen in mountainous regions, 
slides are of frequent occurrence. Slides from twenty to 
fifty feet wide and extending up the hillsides from one 
hundred to two hundred feet have come down across the 
road burying it in mud, timber and brush and necessi- 
tating days of clearing before the road is passable. 

Glacial streams are also to be contended with in the 
mountains. These not only have swnft, strong currents 
that undermine and eat away banks and bridge supports 
but they constantly change their channel so that a bridge 



Transportation Problems 341 

will be left high and dry and useless and a new and un- 
fordable stream appear a quarter of a mile or a mile away 
over night. In addition, there may be an outburst from 
some unknown glacial lake that vvall sweep away bridges 
and roadbeds at a moment's notice. These glacial lakes are 
an altogether indeterminable quantity. They form in the 
glaciers, sometimes in cavities underneath the ice, and 
gradually gather until their strength is greater than that 
of their ice walls, when they break through and rush 
down the moraines at the glacier's foot, carrying destruc- 
tion with them. There seems at present no way to fore- 
see, forestall or bridle them. 

Efforts are made to keep the glacial streams in their 
channels. The best method devised so far is a layer of 
loose brush of sufficient length to give the requisite pro- 
tection placed on the threatened bank, perpendicular to 
the current, and weighted with stone enveloped in gal- 
vanized wire netting, the whole being anchored in place 
by wires extending to stable supports. For emergency 
work, when the water is too high to permit of placing the 
wire netting and rock, the brush is made into fascines 
enclosing sacks of earth which are then placed against 
the threatened bank and wired to it and to each other. 

The making of sled roads and trails is not so difficult. 
Sled roads for winter traffic only are cleared for a width 
of sixteen feet with all stumps, hummocks and such 
obstacles removed for a width of eight feet. They are 
constructed where the amount of traffic is not sufficient to 
justify a wagon road, where the cost of building a road 
would be prohibitive, or where the communities along the 
route are amply served by water transportation during 
the open season. If it seems probable that future devel- 
opments may demand or justify a wagon road, the loca- 
tion is made as for a wagon road in order that the work 



342 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

done on the sled may be of use when the improvement is 
made. Over exposed and treeless sections these winter 
trails are staked for guidance in storms. 

The maintenance of the roads also presents some 
imique features. In some districts when the snow and ice 
begin to break up in the spring, a steam heating plant has 
to be used to keep the culverts thawed out else they will 
be destroyed. When the thaw starts, water runs down the 
slopes and ditches carrying silt and debris. This freezes 
at night and does not thaw out as quickly in the morning 
as the snow and ice on the surrounding hillsides, which 
continue to pour down their water to the clogged culverts. 
It soon goes over the top, the road becomes impassable 
and the culvert in danger of being destroyed unless the ice 
is thawed and the outlet kept open. The work of trans- 
porting steam thawing plants over the roads at this season 
of the year gives some idea of the difficulties the road 
commissioner has to grapple with. 

Another problem the road makers often have to face 
is the forming of a small glacier or ice cap over culverts. 
In some places the water will run in a small stream all 
winter, freezing from the bed of the stream upward until 
ice from ten to twelve feet thick is formed over the bridge. 
In the spring the ice melts on the top and also on the sur- 
rounding hills. Most of this water runs under the ice 
block until it is suspended on the culvert, when if the 
weight is too heavy, the culvert will fall. These forma- 
tions have to be watched and the ice chopped. When it 
is remembered that on the Fairbanks road, where this 
occurrence is most usual, there are five thousand culverts, 
the magnitude of this task can be glimpsed. 

As can be seen, road building in Alaska is costly, and 
to secure the best results needs adequate, specific and 
timely appropriations. 



Transportation Problems 343 

The most necessary transportation for the Territory, 
however, is railroads with wagon roads and trails as feed- 
ers. And the most hopeful sign of better times coming is 
the building of the government railroad. At present the 
biggest thing in Alaska is not Mt. McKinley, the gold 
mines, copper deposits, fisheries, or other resources, rich 
as these are, but the government railroad. And by this is 
not meant the miles of trackage or the cars and engines, 
for compared with other railroads these are small, but 
what the government railroad stands for. In Alaska's 
welfare and future it looms tremendously big. It means 
development, it means supplies, it means other railroads 
reaching out to remote parts of the Territory. It means, 
in a word, the opening up of this large and rich country 
to its fullest capacity. 

Not that the government railroad will do all this, for it 
is but a stretch of some five hundred miles. But the de- 
velopment that will begin along its route will gradually 
spread like ripples in water till the effect reaches the 
farthest boundaries. Other railroads will come, other 
cities will be built, mines will be opened in far distant 
places where it is impossible now to work them profitably, 
other industries will spring up in consequence, and Alaska 
will come into the full, rich life that is rightfully hers. 
That is the reason the eyes of all Alaska have been turned 
so eagerly toward this railroad and why the people of the 
Territory have waited so impatiently its completion. 

Congress passed the bill for the construction of rail- 
roads in Alaska in March, 1914, and a commission was 
created by presidential appointment consisting of William 
C. Edes, Frederick Mears and Thomas Riggs, Jr. to take 
the work in hand. An Alaska newspaper writer very 
accurately depicted the task that confronted these men 
when he wrote at the time of their appointment : 



344 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

" Imagine a country possessing more than twenty-six 
thousand miles of seacoast frontage and an area approxi- 
mately one-sixth of the size of the United States. 

" Imagine it in point of population and exploitation of 
resources in but little better condition than the American 
colonies were in about 1650. 

" Imagine a situation in which you, as an engineer, 
were called upon to go into that portion of the country 
which would approximate in size that portion of the 
United States extending on the seacoast from Portland, 
Maine, to Raleigh, North Carolina, and extending back 
into the interior to cover Detroit, Cleveland, Louisville, 
Pittsburgh, and West Virginia, for the purpose of plan- 
ning the future commercial, agricultural, and industrial 
development, particularly of the region named and poten- 
tially of a much greater region. 

" Imagine all this and you will have some idea of the 
task Uncle Sam has given the Alaska Engineering Com- 
mission." 

The commission immediately went to work studying 
the question of routes, and in order to do it in the most 
thorough manner, eleven parties were sent out to cover 
what was thought to be the most desirable territory. 

Surveying in Alaska is not what it is in many parts 
of the country. The season is short. All supplies must 
be taken in on pack horses as the boggy condition of the 
country in many places precludes the use of wagons to 
any extent until roads and trails are made. Horses mire 
in these bogs and often progress is extremely slow. 

After an exhaustive study of all possible routes to the 
interior, the one from Seward to Anchorage, thence along 
the valley of the Susitna River, through Broad Pass and 
down the valley of the Nenana River to Nenana and Fair- 
banks was decided upon. It not only presented the least 



Transportation Problems 345 

difficulties of construction but it tapped coal lands and 
agricultural lands and would assist at minimum cost the 
very development that Alaska needed. 

From Seward northward for a short distance a rail- 
road had been partially constructed. It was begun in 1903 
under the name of the Alaska Central Railroad but meet- 
ing with financial difficulties finally went into a receiver's 
hands. In 1910 it was resuscitated under the name of the 
Alaska Northern Railroad Company and its construction 
again went forward. The work, however, languished and 
cars were only run intermittently, sometimes only a gaso- 
line car carrying a score or more passengers and light 
express matter being used. This road was purchased by 
the government, thus giving a terminal at Seward on the 
coast and a route through the Kenai Peninsula with its 
rich placer and quartz prospects. 

Seward, the coast port of the government railroad, is 
picturesquely situated on one of the most beautiful har- 
bors in the world with great snow mountains towering 
wherever the eye looks. The town is a substantial and 
well-built little city, busy and optimistic. It has its enter- 
prising daily paper, its grammar and high schools, tele- 
phone exchange, well stocked stores, comfortable hotels, 
electric light plant, cable and wireless stations. The water 
supply comes from a pure mountain stream one thousand 
feet above the town. The name was given in honor of 
William H. Seward, who negotiated the purchase of 
Alaska. It seems fitting that his name should thus be 
linked with the greatest possible agent in the development 
of the Territory. 

The harbor is entirely landlocked and is guarded at its 
mouth by massive mountains of rock that permit a nar- 
row passage into the bay. Mountain ridges rise abruptly 
from the water, and their snow-crowned summits are re- 



346 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

fleeted in its clear surface. It was this harbor that 
Baranof chose for shipbuilding and here the first ship 
launched on the Pacific was constructed. 

The Kenai Peninsula, through which the government 
railroad runs northward, is about one hundred and sixty 
miles long and one hundred miles wide and is suggestive 
of Switzerland in the beauty and grandeur of its scenery. 
The mountains rise to a height of eight thousand, nine 
thousand and ten thousand feet and there are many lakes 
and glaciers. It has, however, some good agricultural 
land slightly timbered, and there are tracts for homestead- 
ing ready for the mowing machine. There are thou- 
sands of acres of wild hay that grows higher than a 
horse's back, and cattle could profitably be raised on the 
valley benches. 

Some parts of the Peninsula are underlaid with coal 
and gold is also found. A gold bearing quartz lode was 
discovered in 1898. In fact, the first gold mined in 
Alaska was taken from the Kenai Peninsula and the 
first coal from any Alaskan field was secured here by the 
Russians for the use of Russian steamers. Convict labor 
was used to mine it. When the development of California 
came, a company of San Franciscans and Russians was 
formed for mining the coal, machinery was shipped and 
run by steam power. The ruins of this work can still be 
seen, and balls and chains of the convicts used in working 
the mines are still found. 

This part of Alaska offers many attractions to pros- 
pective miners and settlers. The climate is mild and the 
rainfall not excessive. Its southern harbors are free from 
ice throughout the year and at all times available for 
ocean traffic. Seward affords an outlet for mineral and 
other products whose development the railroad will facili- 
tate. The auriferous gravels are widely distributed, 



Transportation Problems 347 

though at present mined only in a small way because they 
carry values too low to be worked by simple methods. 
Large deposits of lignite coal are accessible and hydro- 
electric development quite possible. 

From Seward the government railroad runs through 
pleasant valleys, some grassy and prairielike, others 
timbered, with mountain peaks piercing the sky line. Then 
gradually it begins to climb and ahead lie the waters of 
beautiful Kenai Lake with green, wooded shores and 
snow peaks nine thousand and ten thousand feet high all 
about. Wherever the eye wanders are glorious visions of 
water and wood and shining glacier and craggy peak. 
The road runs along the shore for a stretch and then 
swiftly climbs the mountain side through gorge and ra- 
vine, crossing several daring trestles, and then sweeps 
down again into the valley of the Placer River. Here a 
glimpse of Spencer Glacier is caught with its five-mile 
front sparkling blue-white in the sun. Snow mountains 
tower all around. Glaciers, some of them larger than any 
in Switzerland, waterfalls, gorges deep and rocky, bridges 
and tunnels, make the route one of surpassing interest 
and beauty. 

As Turnagain Arm is reached, one may see, if the tide 
is coming in, the great waves, or " bores " as they are 
called, that rush in here from ten to forty feet high at 
times and which were the terror of early prospectors. The 
tidal waves in Turnagain Arm are next to those of the 
Bay of Fundy for height and force. When the tide is out, 
the bottom of soft blue mud is bare. 

The road follows the curves of Turnagain Arm with 
the water on one side and the canyonlike formation of the 
mountains on the other. The mountain sides are tim- 
bered to the snow line with spruce and hemlock and above 
this green mantle tower the snow-clad peaks. 



348 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

The name Turnagain Arm was given by Captain Cook 
when he was exploring these waters for the northeast 
passage. When he first turned the prow of his boat into 
the body of water that now bears his name, he thought he 
had found the long sought waterway to Hudson Bay and 
the Atlantic. Turnagain Arm was a great disappoint- 
ment. 

Anchorage, which is soon reached, is the headquarters 
of the Alaska Engineering Commission. It is located at 
the mouth of Ship Creek on a level stretch and is a thriv- 
ing town of pretty homes, hotels, banks, stores of many 
kinds and government shops. It has a water system, 
sewer system, graded streets (many with concrete side- 
walks), an electric lighting system, telephones, a well 
equipped sanitation department, a garbage disposal sys- 
tem and a fire department. Its principal business thor- 
oughfare is a mile long and has twelve-foot concrete 
sidewalks on both sides through the greater portion of 
the town. 

The public school is one of the finest in Alaska. The 
building is three stories in height and has all modern im- 
provements, including steam heat, electric light, water and 
sewer systems, together with school equipment of the 
latest sort. The primary and grammar departments are 
carefully graded and the high school course embraces 
the subjects taught in the accredited high schools of the 
States. A night school is also part of the work of the 
school system and is provided for the purpose of offering 
to adults an opportunity for acquiring such knowledge as 
they may desire. In addition to the common branches of 
study, stenography, typewriting, bookkeeping, public 
speaking, French, Spanish, mineralogy, geology and other 
subjects are taught by qualified teachers at the night ses- 
sions. The school has a library containing more than a 



Transportation Problems 349 

thousand reference books. Text-books and supplies are 
furnished free to all students. 

The town has many fraternal organizations, a Farmers' 
Association, a Fair Association, an energetic Woman's 
Club. There are theatres, a recreation park and many- 
other facilities for enjoying the pleasures of life. 

The harbor needs some dredging to permit ships to 
load and unload at the docks. But when this is done, it 
will make an excellent shipping point especially for coal, 
as it is free from ice eight months in the year. 

From Anchorage the road skirts Knik Arm, another 
branch of Cook Inlet, the water on one side, the moun- 
tains on the other, giving glorious views whichever way 
one looks, until Matanuska Junction is reached, where a 
branch road runs to the Matanuska coal fields. 

From Matanuska Junction the road strikes west and 
then north along the Susitna River, and here the most 
magnificent scenery of all begins, for though this route 
was selected for its practical features, it passes through 
some of the finest scenery in Alaska. On both sides of 
the railroad line the snow-capped peaks of the great 
Alaskan range tower, Mt. McKinley dominating them all. 
It is a vast region of great mountains, beautiful valleys, 
gleaming rivers, spruce forests, and lovely wild flowers, a 
region overpoweringly impressive in the richness of its 
offerings, whether these be the unrivalled scenic beauty of 
the great range of snow peaks with Mt. McKinley twenty 
thousand, three hundred feet high, Mt. Foraker, seven- 
teen thousand feet, and others almost equalling these in 
altitude, the valleys opening on all sides knee deep in rich 
grasses and suggesting the agricultural possibilities of this 
region, the streams with their leaping fish or the forests 
with their abundant animal life. 

The Mt. McKinley National Park lies in this section, 



350 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

though the actual entrance to the Park is some few miles 
distant from the railroad. But there is a station on the 
railroad for the park, and the time is not far distant when 
each summer will see many tourists arriving at this point 
for a holiday outing in one of the most impressively 
beautiful places in the world. 

The Park comprises an area of twenty-two hundred 
square miles. Its longest dimension follows the general 
course of the Alaska range from Mt. Russell, eleven thou- 
sand, five hundred feet high, northward and includes the 
main ranges of this mountain chain that is one of the 
most prominent on the continent. This chain is higher 
and broader than the Sierra Nevada and of greater relief 
and extent than the Alps. In this section that sweeps 
through the park are a multitude of peaks, nine thousand, 
ten thousand, twelve thousand, fifteen thousand feet high, 
and on up to the monarch of all, Mt. McKinley, twenty 
thousand, three hundred feet. Much of the impressive- 
ness is due to the fact that these mountains, especially Mt. 
McKinley, rise from a low tundra shelf and not from a 
high plateau as is usually the case and which detracts from 
the effect of height. No other known peak rises so high 
as Mt. McKinley over its own base, and it is this that 
gives the effect of such stupendous height and grandeur. 

But though Mt. McKinley gives the dominating note, 
the whole park is a place of wondrous beauty and interest. 
There are valleys rich in grass and wild flowers. Spruce, 
birch, and Cottonwood lend their loveliness of green. 
Waterfalls and mountain streams give the flash and move- 
ment of water. Great glaciers sweep down the mountain 
sides. Muldrow Glacier, named for Robert Muldrow of 
the United States Geological Survey, is thirty-five miles 
long and as glaciers go, accessible. When it is considered 
that the largest glacier of the Swiss Alps is only sixteen 



Transportation Problems 351 

miles long, some idea of the stupendous scale upon which 
the scenic beauty of this park is built can be gained. To 
add to the loveliness, great lava flows are to be found here 
and there, giving vivid patches of red, purple, brown and 
green. 

In addition, the park is a great game preserve. Moose 
are plentiful. The white bighorn mountain sheep rove it 
in bands, as many as three hundred having been counted 
in a day. More than a thousand caribou have been seen 
at one time by surveying parties or prospectors. The 
black, brown and grizzly bear are to be found here, and 
smaller animals, especially foxes and beaver, are in 
abundance. With the exception of one region in Africa, 
no other region in the world it is said by those who have 
made a study of the subject, is the home of so much big 
game. 

And yet all this unequalled beauty, outdoor living of the 
most pleasurable kind, and mountain climbing of a rare 
order, for nowhere else in the world are there such high 
climbs above snow line, is comparatively easily accessible. 
A comfortable water trip through wondrously beautiful 
scenery, a railroad journey of fairly brief duration, and 
even the most modestly equipped traveller finds the won- 
ders and beauties of the park his to enjoy as long as he 
will.^ 

The immense height of Mt. McKinley impressed the 
Indians. It was used as a landmark in their journeys, and 
stories about it were woven into their folk lore. By them 
it was called Denali, the Most High. It is claimed by 
some that this name should be retained as it is both beauti- 
ful and significant. Archdeacon Hudson Stuck, who was 

^ At this writing (1918) the railroad is not yet finished 
but it is hoped by those in charge that a short time will see 
it completed. 



352 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

the first to climb the mountain, appHes this name to it 
exclusively, and Dr. George Byron Gordon, of the Uni- 
versity of Pennsylvania, who made an expedition to this 
section for purposes of ethnological research, in a book 
which he has brought out says, " There is no obvious 
sense of fitness to reconcile one to the association of ex- 
President McKinley with a natural feature of the Alas- 
kan landscape. I am going to persist in using the name 
Denali like the savages who have some priority in the 
matter and who have their own fancy for names. The 
builders of the man-made town have an unquestioned 
right to call it what they will, but the mountains are not 
man-made, and having seen this masterpiece of His handi- 
work, I have not the will to remove therefrom the name 
of the Most High." 

Among the early explorers little was known of the 
mountain. Vancouver speaks of " distant stupendous 
snow mountains covered with snow and apparently de- 
tached from each other." Vague as this is it is the first 
mention made even of the range in the reports of the early 
explorers. The Russians evidently knew of it for they 
spoke of a " Bulshaia Gora," or Big Mountain, but no 
definite reference to it as a great peak is in their records. 
William Dall, of the Western Union Telegraph stafif, 
made mention of the mountain chain and gave it the 
name Alaskan Range. 

Arthur Harper and Alfred Mayo, the traders of the 
Yukon, went three hundred miles up the Tanana River on 
one of their exploring expeditions, the first white men to 
ascend this river, and reported finding gold on the river 
bars and also the sight of an enormous snow mountain. 

Frank Densmore saw it and was so enthusiastic in his 
description that the mountain was known for many years 
as Densmore's Mountain. Other prospectors also told of 



Transportation Problems 353 

a great peak looming cloudlike in the sky. But it was not 
until 1896, when W. A. Dickey, a graduate of an eastern 
college, went through here, saw the mountain and stated 
its height to be about twenty thousand feet, that it re- 
ceived the name of Mt. McKinley. He wrote an article 
to the New York Sun about it, but the world at large 
paid little attention to his report for it was classed as 
only another of the wild tales which emanated from 
Alaska. But another discovery about the same time as 
the publication of his article, that of the Klondike gold, 
altered the status of Alaska in the public mind. The gov- 
ernment began to realize its long neglect of this vast 
possession. Money was appropriated for its development. 
The United States Geological Survey began a series of 
explorations and surveys that brought definite, accurate 
knowledge of the Territory. 

Of the government surveying parties sent to Alaska in 
1898, one made the first determination of the height and 
position of Mount McKinley. By a rough triangulation, 
Dickey's remarkably accurate estimate of the height of 
Mt. McKinley was verified. It was only after the publica- 
tion of the results of this survey that Dickey received any 
adequate recognition from the public for his important 
contribution to geographic knowledge. 

With the mountain definitely located and its height 
ascertained, came the ambition to climb it. Judge Wick- 
ersham of Fairbanks, and at that time Judge of the Dis- 
trict of Alaska, made the first attempt. In 1903, with 
four others, he left Fairbanks and undertook the climb 
from the impossible north side. The party reached an 
altitude of about ten thousand feet but were compelled to 
return. 

About the same time Dr. Frederick A. Cook made the 
attempt but came to the same barrier that stopped Judge 



354 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Wickersham. Three years later, accompanied by Pro- 
fessor Herschel Parker and Mr. Belmore Browne, he 
made another attempt, but did not get across the Range. 
With one companion Cook came back by another route 
late in August and claims that he climbed it. This con- 
troversy is too well known to comment upon. 

In 1910, Thomas Lloyd, Charles McGonogill, William 
Taylor, Peter Anderson and Bob Home, prospectors and 
miners, and E. C. Davidson, a surveyor, set out from 
Fairbanks to make the ascent. Davidson and Home 
eventually left the party but the others continued. This 
expedition was the first to discover the only route so far 
found by which the mountain can be climbed. Lloyd, 
while hunting mountain sheep in previous seasons, had 
discovered the key to the labyrinth in Muldrow Glacier, 
Two of the party reached the top of the north peak and 
planted a flagstaff there. With nothing but climbing irons 
strapped to their moccasins and poles in their hands and 
without ropes they made the last stretch of the ascent. 

Later in the summer of 1910, Professor Parker and 
Mr. Belmore Browne, members of the second Cook party, 
made another attempt but tried from the inaccessible side • 
and the effort failed. In 1912 they organized another ex- 
pedition. This time they had the information about the 
Muldrow Glacier route. Delays and then blizzards and 
the exhaustion of their food supplies compelled them to 
give up the attempt after they had reached a height of 
some seventeen thousand feet for their final camp and 
from this had come within a few hundred feet of the top. 
From their high base camp of seventeen thousand feet 
several attempts were made for the top but blizzards and 
storms prevented their reaching it and finally they had to 
break camp and leave without accomplishing their pur- 
pose. 



Transportation Problems 355 

The mountain was at last climbed by Hudson Stuck, 
archdeacon of the Yukon, and three companions, Mr. 
Harry P. Karstens, Mr. Robert G. Tatum, and a half- 
breed boy, Mr. Walter Harper. Harper was the first to 
reach the summit and thus a native Alaskan was " the 
first human being to set foot on the top of Alaska's great 
mountain." says Dr. Stuck in his most interesting account 
of the conquest of the peak. The ascent was accomplished 
June 7, 1913. Archdeacon Stuck gives a most delightful 
description of the climb in a book published the following 
year. 

Beyond the Mt. McKinley Park station, the railroad 
continues to Broad Pass. This is a wide, valleylike open- 
ing between the mountains, evidently the path of an old 
glacier. Here the range is crossed and the route winds 
down across rivers and through country dotted with lakes 
to the Nenana River section. In some places the road has 
been cut in the solid rock and canyons and narrow gorges 
lend a wildness and picturesqueness that enchants and 
thrills. 

Soon the Nenana coal fields are reached, a section not 
so interesting perhaps to the tourist but of supreme im- 
portance to Alaskans for it is this coal that will be of in- 
valuable help in developing interior Alaska. At Nenana 
the Tanana River is crossed and thence the line runs over 
the route of the Tanana Valley Railroad through gentle 
hills and poplar and willow thickets to Fairbanks. 

As Alaska becomes better known undoubtedly one of 
the great tourist trips of this country will be over this 
railroad from Seward to Fairbanks and then out by the 
auto road to the coast or vice versa. It is doubtful if such 
a trip can be equalled elsewhere in the world for mag- 
nificent scenery and varied interests. 

There are but few other railroads in the Territory. Of 



356 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

these the Copper River and Northwestern may be said to 
be the most important, because the White Pass road, 
though a means of transportation for freight and passen- 
gers to Alaska, is not in American territory except for a 
short distance. 

The Copper River and Northwestern Railroad extends 
from Cordova to Kennicott, a distance of about one 
hundred and ninety-six miles. It was built entirely in the 
interests of the copper mining industry of the Copper 
River Valley and though it traverses a magnificent section 
of the country scenically and is used by tourists, its main 
business is the transporting of copper ore from the mines 
to tidewater at Cordova. It was completed in 1911 at a 
cost of $20,000,000. When the project of building the 
road was first broached many engineers said it could not 
be done. But they did not reckon with the Alaskan spirit. 
The roa4 was needed. That was enough. Mr. E. C. 
Hawkins, the engineer of the White Pass road, was placed 
in charge, with Mr. J. L. McPherson, now secretary and 
manager of the Alaska Bureau of the Seattle Chamber of 
Commerce, as one of his able assistants and the work was 
begun. 

Without doubt the task that confronted these men was 
one of the most difficult engineering problems in America. 
The route lay through one of the most rugged mountain 
regions of the continent, with glaciers, glacial streams, 
deep canyons, one of them being three hundred feet high, 
and swift rapids, to be conquered. In the bridge building 
alone were problems such as had never before been pre- 
sented. The delta of the Copper River offered difficulties 
at the very outset, for there is almost no ground here for 
construction camps and only green alders and willows for 
fuel. But the men were not deterred. Camps were made 
somehow, surveying went forward even at a temperature 



Transportation Problems 357 

of fifty below, supplies were pushed up the river even 
though it took six months to get material from Cordova 
only to the glacial region. 

While the famous bridge across the river between the 
Miles and Childs Glaciers that alone cost a million and a 
half dollars was being built, the work on the road beyond 
was going forward. For this construction, men, machin- 
ery and supplies had to be ferried across the river. Al- 
though the boat for this work had been especially built 
and was reinforced with steel, so terrific were the ice-laden 
waves caused by the fall of bergs in the river from the 
glaciers that often it would have to tie up to the bank 
and make repairs before it could continue its task of 
taking rails, spikes, ties, engines and such things that the 
railroad builders needed. 

At one time a glacial lake in Miles Glacier broke and 
the water and ice flooded twenty miles of track that had 
been completed, tearing out the trestles, washing out the 
embankment and generally destroying the work that had 
been at such effort finished. A mountain slide in Aber- 
crombie Canyon buried the track at another time and cut 
off all communication with the workers beyond. 

The construction material had to be taken forward in 
all sorts of fashions. In some places it had to be towed 
up the river, which has a deep, swift, ice-cold current, by 
the men who had to push their way through tangled Cot- 
tonwood thickets, and these thickets need to be seen to 
realize their density, while others of the crew had to wade 
in the water to keep the boat off the rocks. At other 
places, especially in the winter, it was sledded forward. 
But this was not so easy as it sounds, for the ice on the 
river was piled in barriers and at other places filled with 
dangerous pot holes. This work of getting in the ma- 
chinery and supplies was so especially difficult because 



358 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

there was little good roadway. The river ran most of the 
proposed route between sheer rock walls and glaciers. 
The current in many places is swift and dangerous and 
boils over great rocks, making rapids far more perilous 
than the White Horse Rapids. Much of the roadbed has 
been blasted from the rocky cliffs, but before this blasting 
was done there was no roadway for getting in supplies. 
Some of this rock work cost $200,000 a mile. At one 
place one thousand kegs of black powder and thirty-five 
cases of Number One dynamite were used to move twelve 
thousand cubic yards of rock. 

But the building of the eleven hundred and fifty foot 
bridge across the river between Miles and Childs Glaciers 
was the greatest feat of the whole engineering problem. 
Millions had to be risked on the chance that the bridge 
would hold, for if this bridge could not be accomplished 
the rest of the road was valueless. 

Within one hour of the time the last piece of bridge 
steel was delivered on the bank, the first girder was in 
place. In ten and a half days the first span, four hundred 
feet long, was completed; in six days the second span, 
three hundred feet long, was finished, and in ten days the 
third, four hundred and fifty feet long. 

The temporary foundation of this third span was thou- 
sands of piles driven deep into the bottom of Copper 
River. The ice was a solid sheet seven feet thick. In this 
the piles were solidly frozen. Before the work was com- 
pleted, the spring thaw set in and the ice cap lifted twenty 
feet and began to move. Something had to be done, and 
that quickly, or the whole structure would be wrecked. The 
men within reach were called to the scene, the steam from 
every stationary engine driven into small feed pipes and 
every man set to the task of steam melting or chopping the 
ice clear of the pilings. Day and night the holes were kept 



Transportation Problems 359 

open but despite all efforts the span began to move. 
Anchorages were then made, block and tackle rigged, and 
while the melting and chopping went on, the four hundred 
and fifty foot span which was gradually being carried 
away was dragged back inch by inch, bolted and riveted 
and the bridge saved. 

To protect the bridge from the ice a row of eighty- 
pound rails one foot apart are placed around each pier 
and a kind of false piers or current breakers are also built 
near. 

Commercially, the road is valuable, for it makes avail- 
able some of the world's richest deposits of copper. But 
it is also valuable as a wonderful feat of engineering that 
demonstrates the ability of man to conquer the seemingly 
unconquerable. 

The other railroads in Alaska are negligible. In the 
earlier days some railroads were built in the Seward 
Peninsula from Nome to Sheldon, a distance of about 
eighty miles, and from Council City to near-by creeks. 
But these roads have been abandoned. The Alaska 
Anthracite Railroad has been completed from tidewater 
on Bering River, which flows into Controller Bay, to the 
Bering coal fields, a distance of twenty-two miles. It is 
planned shortly to extend this road to deep water on 
Okalee Channel, an additional distance of eight miles. 



CHAPTER XXV 

THE NATIVES AND THEIR EDUCATION 

The Indian tribes of Alaska. The early Russian mis- 
sionaries. Mission work after the purchase. The mis- 
sions OF TO-DAY. The work of the Bureau of Education. 
Native schools. CoSperative stores. The reindeer in- 
dustry. Reindeer fairs. Plans for the future. 

One of the most important problems that confronted 
the United States government when it took over Alaska 
was the care of the native population, though in the 
beginning there was little recognition of this responsibil- 
ity. The first result of the change of ownership was for 
the native undoubtedly harmful. Intoxicating liquors 
were taken among them without restriction. William 
Dall shortly after the purchase relates, " I saw a small 
schooner lying in the bay. I made out one white man on 
it and the round sides of two barrels rose conspicuously 
above the gunwales. I felt sick as I sat down, knowing 
that the cargo must consist of rum and seeing already the 
beginning of evils whose future growth none could esti- 
mate." The morality of many of the first settlers and 
traders was not of a high order and by association, habits 
and vices were fixed upon the Indians that resulted in 
their gradual deterioration. 

The natives of Alaska belong to several distinct tribes. 
Along the Arctic Ocean, Bering Sea, and the western 
coast are the Eskimos or Innuits. The Eskimos speak of 
themselves as Innuits. The word Eskimo means fish 
eater and is a term applied by the Indians of the interior 

360 



The Natives and their Education 361 

to those of the coast and is disHked by the Innuits. Some 
claim that the Aleutians are an offshoot of the Eskimo. 
Others maintain that they are a distinct tribe. In the 
interior are the Athabascans. To these is applied the 
general name Indian. They are supposed to belong to 
the tribes of the north central part of the continent and to 
have migrated westward from the Mackenzie and Atha- 
bascan regions. Along the southeastern shore are the 
coast Indians, of which there are three principal tribes, 
the Hydahs or Haidas, the Thlinkets, and the Tsimp- 
sians. 

Ethnologically there are many more divisions and sub- 
divisions and ethnologists are scarcely agreed among 
themselves as to the origin of the tribes to be found in 
Alaska. But popularly these four distinctions have been 
made because the natives easily fall into these groups by 
reason of geographical distribution and distinctive char- 
acteristics. 

It is not difHcult for almost any one to distinguish 
between an Eskimo and an Indian of the interior, or be- 
tween an Aleut and a native of the southeastern part. 
There is a difference in stature, a difference in facial 
characteristics, a difference in mentality, due in large 
part to different methods of living and difference in food. 
The Indians of the southeastern part and of the interior 
pursue their occupations mostly on land and among moun- 
tains and forests, whereas the Eskimos and Aleuts live 
mostly on the water. The active life of the former over 
mountains and through forests in the pursuit of game 
breeds a different physique from that which comes sitting 
in boats fishing and living principally on fish. Some 
ethnologists, however, believe that the stature and appear- 
ance of the Eskimo are due to the admixture of Oriental 
blood. It is a question upon which there is much divi- 



362 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

sion of opinion, but the fact of at least several distinct 
tribes in Alaska is generally accepted. 

The Aleuts were the first to come under the domination 
of foreigners, for it was the islands to the westward that 
were earliest discovered and settled by the Russians, 
They were a gentle, kindly natured people given to dances 
and festivities and good to each other. It is said that 
the hunters always divided their spoils with the aged, 
infirm, and those incapacitated for hunting. 

After the various brutal attacks of the Russians, the 
Aleuts attempted occasionally to defend themselves, but 
with little success, for they had nothing but their darts 
and arrows with which to oppose the firearms of their 
invaders. Soon they sank into a state of practical slav- 
ery. They were compelled to hunt the sea otter by their 
conquerors. They were sent on long voyages in their 
skin boats and many were drowned. They were ruth- 
lessly murdered. It is said that for a hundred years the 
cruelties committed by the first Russians were recounted 
by the sad, poverty-stricken descendants of the once 
happy, prosperous Aleuts. 

The Eskimos are the same gentle, kindly, smiling peo- 
ple. Being farther to the north, they escaped the on- 
slaughts of the early Russians, though later they suffered 
in other ways from the traders of other nations. But 
as a race they are to-day in a far better condition than 
their brothers, the Aleuts. 

Both are industrious, and skilful and artistic in the 
execution of their handwork. The Eskimos are always 
working, either carving ivory, working on skins or furs, 
whittling bows and arrows with which they are very 
skilful in killing ptarmigan. Their boats are models of 
lightness, grace and careful workmanship. The kind 
holding two or more is called by them oomiak and by the 




A NATIVE ALASKAN INDIAN 



The Natives and their Education 363 

Russians bidarra; the style in which the skin covering 
is brought up over the top so as to leave an opening for 
only one occupant is called kyak by the Indians, bidarka 
by the Russians. The similarity of the Russian names 
has been confusing to many. 

With no weapons but spears, sometimes tipped with 
ivory, these natives of the northern and western part of 
Alaska killed whales and sea otter. They caught fish 
with improvised hooks of ivory. They improvised lamps 
by hollowing out stones. They were not without artistic 
ability. They arranged feathers in their wearing apparel 
with an eye to color and design. And to-day the carved 
ivories of the Eskimos are quaint, full of character and 
vigor, and the baskets of the natives of Attu are counted 
among the most beautiful of Indian basketry. 

The Indians of southeastern Alaska were much fiercer 
and more cruel. Tales of cannibalism are told of them. 
Prisoners taken in their tribal wars were made slaves, 
and often at feasts and dances these slaves were killed as 
part of the ceremonies. It was no unusual thing when 
a house raising took place for the body of a slave that 
had just been killed to be laid at each corner and the 
posts of the building to be placed upon it. 

The captain of an American vessel trading in these 
waters in the early days says of these natives, " A more 
hideous set of beings in the form of men and women 
1 never saw. The fantastic manner in which many of 
the faces of the men are painted is intended probably to 
give them a ferocious appearance. Some groups look as 
if they had escaped from the dominions of Satan him- 
self. One had a perpendicular line dividing the two sides 
of his face, one side of which was painted red, the other 
black, with the hair daubed with grease and red ochre 
and filled with down of birds. Another had the face 



364 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

painted with horizontal hnes in the middle and painted 
black and white. The visage of a third was painted in 
checkers." 

But with these cruel and treacherous characteristics 
and love of the grotesque went a greater amount of in- 
telligence and skill than the other natives possessed. 
Their boats, their beadwork, and their carving showed 
ability of an unusual order, and to-day the Indians of this 
section are among the most progressive of the natives of 
Alaska. 

The Indians of the interior were more forceful than 
the Aleuts and less cruel than those of the coast. In the 
main, they were kindly, though at times, driven by the 
brutalities and aggression of the Russians as they estab- 
lished their trading posts farther and farther up the 
Yukon, they retaliated, as shown by the massacres at 
Nulato and Andreafski. But these occurrences were 
rare. 

Some educational and religious work for the natives 
had been done prior to the purchase. Shelikof estab- 
lished a school in 1785 and as soon as the Russian colonies 
were on a stable basis missionaries were asked for and 
sent. One of the earliest of these was Father Juvenal, 
a man undoubtedly of high ideals, earnest and conscien- 
tious in his beliefs, but weak in practice. He suffered 
many hardships and was finally killed by the natives, but 
religiously he left little impression upon those among 
whom he worked. In his " Journal " he gives graphic 
pictures of his work, his experiences and his environment. 
Writing from Three Saints Harbor in 1796, he says, 
" With the help of God a school was opened at this place 
to-day, the first since the attempt of the late Mr. Shelikof 
to instruct the natives of this neighborhood." Describ- 
ing a service which he held he says, " We had fine singing 



The Natives and their Education 365 

and a congregation with a great outward show of devo- 
tion. I could not help but marvel at Alexander Alex- 
andrevitch (Baranof), who stood there and listened and 
crossed himself, gave the responses at the proper time 
and joined in the singing with the same hoarse voice 
with which he was shouting drunken songs the night 
before when I saw him in the midst of a carousal." His 
description of a visit to the mainland shows some of the 
hardships endured. The cabin being taken by Baranof, 
he was shown to a small place in the hold between some 
bales of goods and some dried fish. In this dark and 
smelly place, with the light of a wretched lantern, he 
wrote his " Journal," *' unable to partake of food and 
buried under a heap of dried fish whenever the boat 
rolled," His description of a visit to Baranof is a true 
self -revelation, " I found him seated in front of a tent 
while a servant prepared tea. He did not ask me to be 
seated or to partake of tea, though it was nearly a year 
since I had tasted any. After some unpleasant joke, 
however, Baranof offered tea. I felt I ought to refuse 
but my longing was too strong. I degraded myself be- 
fore God and man for the sake of a drink of tea. Re- 
freshed but ashamed, I left the wicked man to pray in 
my humble retreat for strength and pride in the sanctity 
of my calling." 

Veniaminof is, however, the Russian missionary best 
known. He learned the Aleutian language and trans- 
lated into it various books explaining the doctrines of the 
church. He labored faithfully among the Aleutians for 
many years and under his rule several schools and 
churches were established. Some of the governors that 
followed Baranof aided in the establishment and main- 
tenance of schools. But so far as the natives were con- 
cerned there were few practical results, though Veniami- 



366 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

nof claims differently. But at the time of the purchase 
only a small proportion of the natives could read or write, 
and in regard to the religious services the natives are 
described as " squatting and smoking during service, lis- 
tening, bowing, crossing themselves and laughing so up- 
roariously that the officiating priest was often interrupted 
in his solemn duty. They cared not for religion, or at 
least not for the doctrine of the Greek Church." Ve- 
niaminof could hold their attention. " All the people 
listened and listened without moving until he stopped." 
But the other priests had no such power. 

With the exception of this work of the Russians, the 
efforts of Father Duncan at Metlakatla, and the labors of 
some English missionaries of the Yukon, the natives were 
in their primitive condition when the United States took 
over Alaska. And for fifteen years and more our gov- 
ernment gave little thought to them. Had not the mis- 
sions of the country stepped in, the little enlightenment 
which the Russians had left behind and other mission- 
aries had labored to instil would have been obliterated. 

The Presbyterians were the first to come forward. A 
school and mission were opened at Wrangell in 1877 and 
a year later another at Sitka. Following this, the mission 
at Haines was established, and others followed, until now 
the Presbyterians have churches, Sunday Schools and 
missions from Point Barrow, the most northerly mission 
in the world, to Ketchikan. Included in their work is a 
modern and completely equipped hospital and the fine 
Sheldon Jackson School at Sitka. 

The Methodists also early began plans for helping the 
natives. In 1879, Bishop Haven proposed the estabhsh- 
ment of a mission in Alaska, but he passed away before 
the plans were carried out. In 1886, the Methodist Home 
Missionary Society opened a mission on Unga Island, 



The Natives and their Education 367 

and the work thus started by the Methodists has been con- 
tinued in the Jesse Lee Memorial Home at Unalaska, the 
most westerly Methodist church on the American con- 
tinent. The Methodists also have missions at Nome and 
at Sinuk. 

In the '70's the Roman Catholic church started mission 
work in Alaska, beginning first on the Yukon. Now they 
have some twenty missions in various parts of the Terri- 
tory, the largest and best-known being probably the Mis- 
sion of the Holy Cross on the Yukon. 

Before the purchase the missionary society of the 
Church of England was sending workers into the terri- 
tory along the Yukon River. Two of the best-known of 
these early workers were Archdeacon Robert McDonald 
and Bishop Bompas. In 1862, Archdeacon McDonald 
established the first church mission of which there is any 
record, on the Yukon. He translated the Bible, the 
prayer book, the hymn book and several other volumes 
into the Indian language and worked among the natives 
untiringly. 

In 1865 the Rev, W. C. Bompas, later Bishop Bompas, 
came to the Yukon and joined in the work among the 
Indians. 

When the United States purchased the Territory, the 
Protestant Episcopal church of this country took up the 
work on the Yukon, and its missions are scattered up and 
down the river and throughout the interior. Not only 
has it established churches and schools but it has erected 
and maintained several good hospitals and is doing ex- 
cellent work in a broad way among the natives of the 
interior. 

Other denominations also entered the mission field. 
The Moravians started missions on the lower Yukon and 
on the Kuskokwim, The Society of Friends went far 



368 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

north on the Arctic Ocean and began work among the 
Eskimos. Finally, by mutual agreement among the 
various denominations, it was decided that each denom- 
ination should take a certain part of the Territory and 
confine its work to that section. Under this arrangement, 
the Presbyterians, being the first to come to southeastern 
Alaska, chose that. The Baptists took Cook Inlet and 
thereabouts. The Methodists held to their field on the 
Aleutian Islands, and the Moravians did the same with 
the field they had chosen on the Kuskokwim. The 
Friends are still working in the Arctic region and a mis- 
sion of theirs is established on the Kobuk. It is in 
charge of an enthusiastic worker who untiringly teaches 
the natives " book learning," cleanliness and religion. 
The Society of Friends is to be commended for the prin- 
ciples of temperance they have instilled in the natives, for 
their missionaries have been especially successful in cre- 
ating an aversion for intoxicants. 

The Congregationalists have various missions along 
Bering Sea, the Swedes on Norton Sound, and the Nor- 
wegians in the Port Clarence district. 

Before missionary work was thus fully organized the 
government awoke to the necessity of doing something 
for the natives and in 1884 an appropriation was made 
for educational purposes. The work at first was turned 
over to the missions, since they already had schools 
established. Dr. Sheldon Jackson, who was the first sec- 
retary of the Presbyterian Board of Home Missions and 
whose name was almost synonymous with early mission- 
ary and educational work in Alaska, was appointed first 
Superintendent of Education. But as this arrangement, 
which was really subsidizing the missions, aroused some 
opposition, as it was contrary to the American principle 
of the separation of church and state, it was finally aban- 



The Natives and their Education 369 

doned and a Bureau of Education for the Natives was 
established with Dr. Jackson first general agent. 

This bureau is doing excellent work. It has schools 
for the natives ranging from the most southeasterly sec- 
tions to Point Barrow on the Arctic Ocean, westward on 
the Aleutian Islands and even on the St. Lawrence and 
the Diomede Islands of Bering Sea. 

The usual studies are taught, some schools taking their 
pupils as high as the eighth grade, though most of them 
reach only about the fifth grade. The teaching is done 
in very practical fashion. In arithmetic, for instance, 
the children are instructed to figure the cost of tea, bread, 
flour, sugar and the articles of daily use and to make 
bills for the same, thus learning arithmetic as it is con- 
nected with daily life rather than as something abstract 
and uninteresting. Another efficient way in which arith- 
metic is taught in some of the schools is by the arithme- 
tic game. In this two captains are named by the teacher 
and these choose their aids. Questions are then given 
by members of each side to their opponents, the questions 
being the result of each one's own mental effort. 

The language work includes the making of an Indian- 
English dictionary in which all become tremendously 
interested and thus forget their hesitancy in speaking 
English. 

When a wireless or telegraph station is near at hand 
the discussion of the news is part of the morning's exer- 
cises. So eager are the natives to get in touch with the 
world that it is no uncommon thing to have the school- 
room full of adults to hear the news. This dissemination 
of the news arouses interest in geography and history and 
makes the teaching of these branches easy. In fact the 
wireless has done more to arouse the slumbering intelli- 
gence of the native than years of abstract book work. 



370 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

It has brought education to him imperceptibly and given 
him an appetite for more. 

The pupils are also taught manual training, domestic 
science and gardening. The girls cut and make dresses 
and often wear to school the results of their handwork. 
Sewing machines are now in almost every Indian village 
and in some villages almost every native home has its 
sev/ing machine. 

Cooking is also a part of the instruction. The teacher 
not only gives the instruction at the school but, when 
possible, goes to the children's homes and teaches them 
there, as it has been found that instruction based on 
actual conditions that will confront the pupil is more 
helpful. 

The boys are taught carpentry and make log cabins, 
canoes, boats and sleds. The Yukon sleds they build 
find a ready sale. They are also instructed in sheet iron 
work and make airtight stoves, cook stoves, camp stoves 
and stove pipe, all of which find ready buyers. 

Gardening is also taught, and not only are good school 
gardens made but many native homes have their garden 
patches as the result of what is taught in the schools. 
The pupils take great pains in preparing the soil, dili- 
gently picking out every root and stone. Corn, tomatoes, 
string beans, cabbage, radishes, turnips and other vege- 
tables are raised. Over-supplies are canned and stored 
for winter. Some are sold. At one Indian village seven 
hundred and fifty dollars were realized one season from 
the sale of the vegetables raised in the gardens as a result 
of the school work. 

The native schools do much besides teaching the school 
curriculum. The teachers are missionaries in spirit and 
do whatever they can to improve the welfare of the people 
generally. 



The Natives and their Education 371 

The matter of sanitation is one in which they work as 
earnestly as at teaching. At one village when the teacher 
first went there several years ago there were but four 
cabins above ground, two half under ground and four 
huts altogether under ground, beaver style, ten habitations 
for about one hundred and fifteen people. To-day the 
village is spread over a space of not less than five acres 
upon which are erected three rows of dwellings, twenty- 
four in number. Each, as a rule, is occupied by one 
family ; they are well lighted and have means of ventila- 
tion without opening the door. In 1911 there were no 
ranges in this village and only one sewing machine. Now 
there are five ranges, nineteen stoves, eighteen sewing 
machines and six phonographs. Tables, chairs, rocking- 
chairs, bedsteads and bed springs are to be found in these 
homes. Premises are clean and the rubbish is burned. 

Before a school was established on St. Lawrence 
Island, which is ice-bound and inaccessible eight months 
in the year, the natives were uncouth barbarians, living 
in filthy houses, afflicted with all manner of diseases, ad- 
dicted to the use of intoxicating liquors. They were at 
the mercy of the traders and whalers as to the prices 
received for their commodities. For food they were en- 
tirely dependent upon their uncertain catch of seal and 
walrus. All this is now happily changed. 

Throughout Alaska the natives are taught to take baths 
and to wash their clothes. In some parts of the Terri- 
tory these are no easy tasks, for the only water to be had 
must be secured by melting snow. In order to bathe 
Saturday the snow melting must commence Monday and 
go forward all the week. Very possibly the only wood 
to be secured is driftwood that washes up on the beach. 
This cannot be collected in winter and the supply has to 
be frugally managed. 



372 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Steam home canning outfits have been introduced into 
many villages where under the supervision of the teach- 
ers the surplus vegetables, wild berries and fish are put 
up for winter use. 

One of the most important things that the Bureau of 
Education has done for the natives is the institution of 
the cooperative store. These are now established in a 
number of Indian villages and others are constantly being 
formed. They are really a native stock company under 
government supervision. The natives take shares at a 
certain amount each, usually ten dollars, the teacher tak- 
ing one share. A Board of Directors is elected, the 
teacher being one of the board. A local storekeeper is 
selected who must, of course, be a native and he, with the 
assistance of the teacher, manages the business. 

The best organized stores have a cash register, which 
is a great asset to the Indians, as they seem to have far 
more faith in their storekeeper when assisted by a cash 
register than when not. At the end of the year an 
auditor goes over the accounts and sees that all is cor- 
rect. The whole process of the business is fully ex- 
plained to the Indians, so that they thoroughly under- 
stand all that is being done. 

Three kinds of dividends are paid, a cash dividend on 
the stock, a stock dividend on the stock, and a dividend 
on cash purchases made by the purchaser at the store. 
This last is done to encourage them to trade at the store. 
Prices are those of the public markets as a rule, as the 
stores are not intended to disturb trade. The stores are 
simply for the purpose of securing articles of clothing and 
food at equitable prices, the dividing among the natives 
themselves of profits that would otherwise go to a white 
trader, and the acquiring by the natives of self-confidence 
and business exoerience. 



The Natives and their Education 373 

The income of one village has increased one hundred 
and fifty per cent because of the cooperative store there. 
One of these stores in southeastern Alaska paid a divi- 
dend of nearly twenty per cent. In another settlement 
three annual dividends have been declared and more than 
twelve hundred dollars has been returned to the natives 
who use the store. Another of the stores made a clear 
profit of one hundred and twenty-five per cent the first 
year. It is hoped by those in charge that in the course 
of time all the Indian villages will have their cooperative 
stores. Supplies then could be bought in such large 
quantities that a still greater saving could be effected. 

Another work the Bureau has undertaken for the 
natives is the marketing of their furs and ivories and 
other articles of trade. These are shipped by mail or 
express to the headquarters of the Bureau in Seattle, 
when at stated times they are auctioned off to the highest 
bidder. Since the work was undertaken these sales have 
totalled some twenty-five thousand dollars. Articles that 
heretofore brought the Indians from seventy-five cents to 
one dollar in trade with unscrupulous traders have real- 
ized by this plan as high as forty and forty-five dollars. 
If the natives wish, supplies they need are bought with 
the money at wholesale prices if possible and sent back to 
them by the vessel making delivery of supplies to the 
settlements on the Arctic coast. When checks are sent, 
as it takes practically nine months for a check to reach 
its destination in the Arctic and return, the money is 
placed in a savings bank at interest. 

But by far one of the biggest and most helpful things 
the Bureau has done for the native is the introduction of 
reindeer. It is believed this will become one of the im- 
portant industries of Alaska and of great value to the 
coimtry at large. 



374 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

The first reindeer were brought to Alaska in 1892 for 
the purpose, it was stated, of affording relief to the des- 
titute natives. It was claimed that the whalers in Bering 
Sea and the Arctic Ocean had destroyed much of the food 
supply of the Eskimos not only in the waters from which 
the Eskimos had drawn abundantly of seal and walrus 
and other food, but by the use of firearms had driven the 
caribou back into the interior. The Eskimos, it was 
claimed, were starving, and as a remedy it was suggested 
that reindeer be brought from Siberia. The matter was 
called to the attention of Congress and Dr. Sheldon Jack- 
son, who was in Washington at the time, was instrumen- 
tal in getting an appropriation from Congress for the 
purpose. In the first ten years about twelve hundred and 
eighty deer were imported. The herd now numbers one 
hundred and eighteen thousand, and the total income to 
the natives exclusive of the meat and hides used by them 
was $97,515.00. 

With the first herd, Siberian caretakers were brought 
to look after the animals and to instruct the Eskimos in 
their management. But these not proving satisfactory, 
Laplanders were engaged with later herds that came. 
The arrangement with the Laplanders included an agree- 
ment to loan them a certain number of deer for five years 
if they stayed in the government employ for a certain 
length of time. But the gold excitement broke out in 
Alaska shortly after they arrived and all but eight de- 
serted. These eight, however, remained and claimed 
their deer, and this is how there is at present a certain 
number of reindeer in Alaska belonging to Laplanders. 
One of the Lapps who deserted bought some deer after- 
ward from his fellow countrymen, formed a company 
and went into the business of raising reindeer for the 
market, which accounts for this branch of the industry. 



The Natives and their Education 375 

caessa ' i r i m i i / i , i ■ ' i ^ 

The only others who have reindeer in addition to the 
natives are some of the missions. These acquired them 
through Dr. Jackson who, when the deer were first intro- 
duced, thought the missions could be helpful in distribut- 
ing the deer among the natives and proposed that the 
government give or loan deer to the missions for this 
purpose. This was done. Some were given outright, 
some loaned, and in this way the missions secured herds 
which some still have. 

With these few exceptions the Eskimos own the rein- 
deer, and one of the most hotly argued questions of 
Alaska is whether they shall be allowed to control the 
industry or whether it shall be opened to the public. 
Those in charge of the work do not object to outsiders 
owning reindeer. All that the officials of the Bureau 
want is proper protection, for the natives, of their herds 
and of the grazing grounds; otherwise, it is claimed, un- 
scrupulous traders would soon get the natives in debt to 
them and take their herds. The reindeer industry is 
bringing to the natives a permanent and settled business, 
changing their uncertain means of living, such as fishing 
and hunting, into something that can be depended upon, 
transforming their nomadic life into permanent homes, 
and giving them a goodly measure of self-respect as men 
of business. If the reindeer industry is snatched away 
from them all this will be lost. 

A most efficient method of managing the reindeer has 
been introduced, known as the apprentice system. By 
agreement the natives who own herds take on an appren- 
tice for four years. The first two or three years the 
apprentices are supported entirely, the remainder of the 
time, partially. During the apprenticeship the young 
native is awarded altogether thirty-four adult deer, six 
at the end of his first year, eight at the end of the second. 



376 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

and ten each the third and fourth year. By the time he 
has finished his four years in this practical reindeer col- 
lege, he receives instead of a sheepskin, thirty-four adult 
deer, which, with their young, means a herd of about 
fifty, which gives him a good start in life. These rein- 
deer owners pledge themselves to keep up the distribu- 
tion by taking on apprentices. When one of them has 
from one hundred to one hundred and fifty deer he must 
take his first student; from one hundred and fifty to two 
hundred and fifty calls for two apprentices ; two hundred 
and fifty to three hundred and fifty, three apprentices. 
It is an endless chain system that gives the Eskimo a 
business and keeps the herds in native hands, for by gov- 
ernment regulations no native may sell a female deer to 
whites. These can be sold only among the natives, and 
then only with the approval of teacher and superin- 
tendent. 

Within the last few years reindeer fairs have been held 
that have done much to increase the interest in the work, 
improve it, and bring the reindeer owners together in a 
unity of interest that will help weld the entire Eskimo 
population together. The men come to these fairs from 
long distances, travelling with the reindeer with outfits 
especially prepared for the occasion and bedecked with 
colors. Often the temperature is from thirty to fifty 
degrees below zero, but their ardor is not chilled. 

Discussions take place as to the best way to judge mar- 
ketable deer, as to the best methods of slaughtering and 
dressing, the best kinds of sleds, and all other matters 
pertaining to the work. There are contests in lassoing 
deer, in driving wild deer, in pulling loads of various 
weights, In sled lashing, racing and such things. Fine 
exhibits are also made of harness, sleds and fur clothing. 

Some of these events are exceedingly interesting and 



The Natives and their Education 377 

novel. For the lassoing contest the herd of eight hun- 
dred deer is driven to a flat and penned in by a sort of 
human corral. When the signal is given the lassoers 
run into the centre of the herd and the fun begins. It 
is a pretty sight to see the gayly dressed natives moving 
back and forth to keep the deer penned in, the well- 
trained collie dogs on the outskirts ready to pick up any 
stray deer that may break through the crowd, the stately 
old females standing on the outskirts of the herd among 
the people, a few trained sled deer mingling freely with 
the people, the camp of eighteen or twenty tents among 
the willows, and the Sawtooth Mountains in the distance. 
The bulls after being lassoed once become very tricky 
and will dodge backward and forward and try in every 
possible way to avoid the lasso. 

The contest for driving wild deer is also exciting. 
At a given signal the contestants enter the herd, rope, 
throw, harness, hitch and drive a hornless wild bull a 
half mile and return, and then unhitch, unharness and 
remove the halter all unassisted. Immediately upon 
being lassoed, the bull will fight to get away and it will 
then become necessary to throw him. The manoeuvring 
to harness him is as exciting. As soon as the harness 
is fastened on, the bull starts to run wild and throws the 
men in all directions. One man who had lassoed the 
largest and wildest bull in the herd was unable to drive 
him at all and finally tied him on the sled and pulled him. 
On the return trip the deer run at a breakneck speed for 
the herd and ?ome speedy and wild rides are experienced. 

The sled lashing contest is one of the most difBcult. 
It is impossible to remove the mittens, for the fingers 
freeze in a few seconds, and if they come in contact with 
any metal adhere immediately. Each sled is loaded with 
stove, grub box, clothing sack and sleeping bag. These 



378 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

have to be strapped and covered so snow cannot enter. 
Outside of the canvas cover, under the lashing w^here they 
can be reached easily, are snowshoes and rifle. 

All the other contests are equally interesting and each 
is instructive ; in the races for instance it has been found 
that the deer can be driven to better advantage double 
than single, as has been the method. 

There are many exhibits. In the one of fur clothing 
there are a number of complete outfits, each consisting 
of parka, pants, mukluks, mittens and sleeping bag, all 
made of deerskin and deerskin trimmings. The judges, 
who are Eskimo women, award the prizes according to 
the length of the stitches, the tying of the thread, the tan- 
ning of the skins, the length and firmness of the hair. 

There are many discussions, and the sound business 
sense and high ethical principles advanced by the Eskimos 
in regard to business dealings with others would astound 
those not in touch with the advance of this race. 

Although more than a hundred people attend these 
fairs and have to be fed and cared for, the Eskimos do 
all this work themselves. 

As can be seen, these fairs are a great help in improving 
the reindeer business and in creating cooperation, good 
will and self-respect among the herders. Each native 
who owns reindeer now holds his head a little higher 
because the man who has no deer at all is " all the same 
as nothing at the fair." The technique of the industry 
has been given an impetus by awakening interest in all 
connected with it. As a result of these fairs a reindeer 
institute has been established where the men meet and 
discuss matters of importance to the work. Thus 
through the reindeer the progress of the Eskimo is as- 
sured. With the meat for food, the skin for clothing, 
harness and leather, the sinew for thread, the horns for 



The Natives and their Education 379 

knife handles, and the hair for mattresses, the reindeer 
meets almost all the needs of the people. It would be 
most unwise to let this industry be taken from them. 

Not only in such large and important matters as the 
reindeer business and cooperative stores does the Bureau 
look after the welfare of the natives, but no detail that 
will help them to self-reliance and a wide outlook on life 
is too small to receive attention. 

In some villages the school republic idea has been 
started and is doing much to inculcate ideas of citizen- 
ship. A council is chosen and the making of laws for 
the republic is left to the members. One of the first 
acts passed in one village was for the care and protection 
of school property. 

Various methods are employed to win the natives to 
the use of English exclusively. In one settlement the 
slogan was adopted, " Hydaburg an English speaking 
town in five years." In town meetings and gatherings 
the subject is always brought up and success seems as- 
sured. In some schools the children are required to 
keep diaries as part of their language work, the diaries 
being written in English. In others they are required 
to write in English the Indian folk stories. 

Both the Boy Scouts and the Camp Fire Girls have 
branches among the natives and the young people are 
very proud of their membership cards. 

The Eskimos have started the publication of a little 
magazine and so popular is it with the people themselves 
that in many Eskimo homes it is kept inside the Bible. 
The Eskimos themselves contribute to it, their articles 
having to do with the reindeer, with histories of the dif- 
ferent tribes, with their own folklore and with such 
subjects as will develop a strong, united Eskimo senti- 
ment. 



380 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Electric light has also reached the Eskimo through the 
work of the Bureau. This means much to the natives, 
not only in the matter of improving the home work, for 
the well lighted home is apt to be more cleanly, and sew- 
ing and such tasks can go forward better, but there is 
greater cheerfulness and the weird fancies and super- 
stitions bred in the semi-darkness of the old time seal 
oil lamp disappear in the bright clear light of electricity. 

But the Bureau is not satisfied with present achieve- 
ments. With the education and development of the na- 
tives new fields ever open. A home for the old, blind, 
and poor natives is much needed. Such homes are pro- 
vided for other peoples, yet the Indians who are quite as 
much in need are neglected. The Indians themselves are 
less able to care for their own helpless than are other 
people, for the native method of life is not as yet on any 
large scale fitted to care for the infirm. 

A good Trades School to which the pupils who have 
graduated from the lower schools could come would be 
invaluable. Several hundred Alaska Indians now go to 
the Indian schools in the States for further education. 
But in a Trades School in Alaska they would be spared 
the expense and time of a long journey, and in addition 
could be taught the things that are specifically needed for 
Alaskan life. Many of these things are not taught in the 
schools in the States because they are not needed outside 
of Alaska. The money spent on their education outside 
of Alaska could be used to much better economic advan- 
tage within the country where they are to live and use 
their training. 

Practical things would be taught. For instance, a 
master mechanic would have charge of the boys and for 
one subject of instruction would repair the engines of 
gas launches that could be sent to the school. The na- 



The Natives and their Education 381 

tives now use several hundred power boats for fishing. 
In the winter these could be overhauled and repaired at 
the school, provide the pupils with practical experience 
and work that would have a zest because it would be 
useful and save the owners of the boats considerable 
expense. 

Instruction in practical boat building would be another 
of the courses. The waterways are largely the natives' 
roads and their means of earning a living. Boats are 
their industrial plant so to speak, and anything that in- 
creases their knowledge in this field and makes them more 
efficient in it is helpful. 

A tannery in which reindeer skins could be made into 
leather and manufactured into articles of commerce 
would be another practical course. There are many 
things the Indians of Alaska need to be specifically taught 
that can be done better in their own school than in schools 
outside where there is no demand for such instruction. 
A start toward this Trades School is now being made 
and it is hoped to have it established at Metlakatla. 

Hospitals are greatly needed. So also are canneries 
in some sections and sawmills in others. Such industries 
are of great help in making the natives economically 
independent, increasing their self-respect, and in giving 
them settlements of permanent character. 

Two acts have been passed recently b}^ the Territorial 
government that have been of great advantage to the 
natives. One provides citizenship and the other local 
self-government. The act for citizenship has given the 
younger generation an incentive to separate themselves 
from Indian customs antagonistic to civilization and to 
reach forward to an intelligent understanding of citizen- 
ship. For many years the position of the Alaska Indian 
has been anomalous. Being born in Alaska he was not a 



3S'2 Alaska. Our Beautiful Northland 



torcig-ncr, hence could not bo luituralircd. Not boitii^; 
rccogtii.-od lis Indians the l'\\lcral laws govornini; the 
Indians ot the States were not appheable. He has been 
conipelleil to obey the white man's laws, to pay trade and 
boat licenses and money into the fntul ior schools for 
white children, yet he had no way to become a citizen. 
As soot\ as Alaskans were pertuitted legislaticMi oi their 
own, steps were taken to remedy this state of ath\irs. 

The Alaskan Indian in his primitive state slunved a 
resource fnlness, an et\durance. anvl an artistic sense that 
are to be admired. \\'ith the educatiot\ he is receivitii;-, 
he is proving- hituself intelligent, reliable and useful. He 
can become a happy aiul helpful part of our people, quite 
as much so as atiy of the foreigners that throng oiu' gates 
and with far tuore right to help and a welcome. The 
art of the Ii\diati is a most desirable adtlition to our art 
life. The Indian baskets atul blaiikets, their beadwork 
and delicate featherwork. the ii\spiration that lies back oi 
these and the keeti eve atul deft hand that guide it, are 
needled in the full development oi beauty. With the 
crude materials of forest ai\il stream thcv have in the 
past evolved tuost e\(|uisite handwork. Their baskets 
made of native grasses and t'lbre ai'c fine in worktnanship 
and the decorations tipon thetn coUired with ilyes ex- 
tracted from roots and vegetables are a delight to the eye 
both in desig-ti atul tititing, Haituy little bags atid to- 
bacco pouches oi tish skiti. swatis' feet atul fur are as 
charming as any white wotuan's fatlc^' work, atul their 
headdresses of beads atid feathers are beatitiful etubod- 
itnet\ts of patiettce, skill and taste. In tlecorative realtus 
alotu\ the Indiati thought is a vahiable aiul dtstitu'tive 
cotitribtition atul the world is the richer for havitig it. 
It should be fostered atiil larger tields ofHMted for a fuller 
developtuetit. It should tu^t be allowed to pass away. 



CHAPTER XXVI 



LIFE IN ALASKA 



The climate. Education, Newspapers, wireless, cables 

AND THE telegraph. ThE PEOPLE AND THEIR INDOMITABLE 
SPIRIT. 

To the question often asked, " What is Hfc in Alaska 
Hke?" one would need to reply, " What part of Alaska? " 
As has been shown, Alaska covers such a vast area and 
presents so many different conditions of climate and en- 
vironment that no one answer would accurately fit it all. 
For instance, Juneau and Nome in the winter are vastly 
different, though in the summer life in each in its main 
features is not unlike. Again, in some places, life in 
Alaska is that of the pioneer; in others, it is that of the 
city dweller, with all modern conveniences. In viewing 
life in Alaska one must have in his mind's eye the vast 
territory and its many varying features. 

The chmate perhaps claims first attention. Throughout 
Alaska in the summer it is warm, even in the far north 
Arctic region. This is due to the long hours of sunshine. 
At Fort Yukon, which is on the Arctic Circle, the ther- 
mometer often registers a hundred and more. William 
Dall, of the Western Union Telegraph Corps, when he 
was there in the '60's tells of a temperature that high. 
Along the automobile route from Fairbanks to the coast, 
thermometers in the sun at roadhouses have registered 
one hundred and six, one hundred and fifteen and one 
hundred and twenty-three degrees. So it is easy to be 
seen that Alaska in the summer is not exactly a cold 

383 



384 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

country. But the air is almost always refreshingly cool 
and invigorating, for it sweeps down from snow peaks 
and glaciers and through countless miles of spruce forests. 
On the coast in the summer there is often a great amount 
of rain. Those planning a trip to Alaska would do well 
to take the Inside Passage during the last two weeks of 
June if possible, and if this cannot be done as soon there- 
after as they can. Good weather here means much to the 
enjoyment of the scenery, for fog or clouds cut off the 
view of the snow mountains, which add so much to the 
beauty of the landscape. 

June twenty-first in Alaska is a great holiday. It 
does not get dark at all and there is direct sunlight from 
twenty to twenty-two hours. There are picnics every- 
where, preferably from an elevation where the midnight 
sun can be seen. At Fairbanks and many other towns 
league games are played at midnight. Indeed this going 
to bed in the daytime is little to the liking of most Alas- 
kans, so exquisitely beautiful are the long sunsets that 
become long sunrises without a break. 

In winter the southeast parts of Alaska have about the 
same temperature as Washington, D. C. At some of the 
farthermost southern points the temperature is not unlike 
that of Jacksonville, Florida. This is due to the warm 
waters of the Japanese current. This current, Kuro Siwo, 
or Black Stream, as it is called by the Japanese because of 
its dark color as compared with the blue, sparkling waters 
of the Pacific, comes up from the Indian Ocean, crowds 
through the passage between Asia and the Philippines, 
flows thence along the east coast of China and Japan, east- 
ward along the south shore of the Aleutian Islands and 
thence southeast along the Alaskan coast. It is more 
beneficial than the Gulf Stream is to the east, for little of 
the cold water of the Arctic finds its way southward. The 



dn Alaskan Sunset 



Life in Alaska 385 



warmth and moisture of this Japanese current cause the 
dense vegetation of the southeast Alaskan shores. 

In the interior at Fairbanks, north of the Yukon, and 
at Nome, the winter temperature may drop forty, fifty, 
and even more, below. But it is mostly a clear, dry cold : 
the people dress for it and no hardship is suffered. The 
long Arctic night, so much talked of, is really not all night, 
as it is supposed to be, for the sun is above the horizon 
for a brief time even on the shortest days and early morn- 
ing and late afternoon are much like twilight. Besides, 
electricity is so common now in Alaska that even the 
myth of the Arctic night has disappeared before it. To be 
sure, an Arctic blizzard is not a pleasant visitation, but 
neither is a North Dakota or Montana blizzard. 

In the larger towns of Alaska life is much the same as 
in any city. These towns have their telephones, their 
electric lights, their telegraphic news from the outside, 
their newspapers, theatres, churches, libraries and schools. 
They all have many fraternal organizations and usually a 
progressive woman's club. 

In the unsettled regions, the country north of the 
Yukon for instance, the Kuskokwim, or the upper reaches 
of the Koyukuk, life of course is that of the pioneer. 
Log cabins replace the pretty bungalows of the cities, oil 
lamps and candles, electricity. Mail does not come very 
often, and in winter sometimes not at all. Life is often 
one of hardship and deprivation. But those living it do 
not so regard it. There is freedom, and always the 
hope of finding gold, and these two lend a zest that makes 
it enjoyable. The Alaskan pioneer may be hatless, shirt- 
less, shoeless, but it is said he is never hopeless. And 
this attitude of mind makes him indifferent to what others 
would consider hardship. 

The Territory has a cable and telegraph system with 



386 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

several thousand miles of cable and land lines, and tele- 
graph offices or wireless stations at the chief cities and 
settlements throughout the Territory. These keep the 
people in touch with the news of the world. The larger 
towns have their newspapers, and bulletins are posted in 
the windows of the newspaper offices the same as in the 
cities in the States. 

Education is well looked after by both the federal and 
the territorial governments. There are grammar schools 
both in incorporated and outside of incorporated towns. 
In some of these, high school branches are also pro- 
vided, and in some towns there are good high schools. 
In Juneau for instance, the high school work offers three 
different courses; classical, scientific, and commercial. 
The first two present work leading to enrollment in a 
college or university. The last is a general course and 
particularly fits the graduate for work in the business 
world. Additional courses in public speaking, mechanical 
drawing and sewing are offered, and domestic science and 
manual training are taught. Juneau High School gradu- 
ates are admitted to the University of Washington and 
other coast universities without entrance examinations. 

The school building at Juneau is modern in every 
respect even to an electric range for the domestic science 
classes. There is an auditorium that seats five hundred, 
a gymnasium with shower baths, the latest high pressure 
heating system, and modern ventilation that does away 
with the opening of the windows. The teachers are re- 
quired every third year to attend a summer school. 

The money for the schools is derived from both the 
federal and territorial governments. From the Alaska 
Fund, which is derived from licenses paid to the federal 
government, a certain per cent is returned to the Terri- 
tory for the support of the schools outside incorporated 



Life in Alaska 387 



towns. These are called Nelson schools because Senator 
Nelson introduced the bill for their establishment at the 
time the schools for white children and those of mixed 
blood were discontinued. This money, though classed as 
federal support, is not really federal aid in its true sense, 
for the money comes directly from the Territory. It 
simply comes through federal channels. In 1917 the 
Territorial legislature appropriated more than $400,000 
for the support of the schools for two years. A Terri- 
torial Board of Education was established of which the 
governor is an ex-officio officer, and a Commissioner of 
Education appointed. The salaries paid teachers are 
higher, and the percentage of teachers who are college 
graduates or who have had previous experience, is greater 
than in the States. 

Churches of almost all denominations are to be found 
in the larger towns. There are numerous stores in all 
the more important cities, some of them being department 
stores. The goods as a rule are of the best quality. 
Freight charges are the same whether the articles brought 
in are high grade or low grade and so the Alaskans insist 
upon the best in order to get the full worth of their money. 
A resident of Fairbanks tersely summed up the situation 
when he said, " We want things that will last when we 
must pay present freight charges." 

And yet, the cost of living in Alaska is not so high as 
outsiders are led to suppose. One is told that the smallest 
currency is twenty-five cents. This is true in the interior, 
but this does not mean that twenty-five cents is the lowest 
price for articles. One simply needs to make his purchase 
amount to twenty-five cents. The things he buys may be 
five or ten cent articles. 

Almost every home has its garden, many have hot- 
houses. There are market gardeners and truck farmers 



388 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

near all the towns and fresh vegetables are to be had at 
reasonable prices. Nearly every large town now has not 
only one but several dairies, and fresh milk, cream and 
butter are abundant. Chickens are numerous and fresh 
eggs are no longer an unknown quantity. Fish are 
abundant and cheap, moose and caribou steaks are found 
in season on the menus of most restaurants and are de- 
licious, nourishing and not costly dishes. It would be of 
little value to quote prices at present (1918) as they are 
not normal, but better meals could be obtained in Alaska 
at this time for the same money than in the States. There 
are comfortable hotels in all the larger towns and many 
restaurants, so that the traveller will not lack accommo- 
dations. 

In fact, life in Alaska is much like life elsewhere, and 
there would be little reason to speak of it specifically ex- 
cept that many seem to think it is strangely and myste- 
riously diflFerent. 

One great pest there is, and that is the mosquito. When 
he disappears, which he is said to do about the last of 
July, his place is taken by the gnat, the " no-see-em " of 
the Indian. It is claimed by many residents of the larger 
towns that the mosquito could be exterminated in the 
vicinity of cities by the use of oil. Perhaps when Alaska's 
oil fields are opened and oil less expensive than it is at 
present, the experiment will be tried. 

As for the people of Alaska, they are " just folks " 
like the rest of us, except that there is a friendliness and 
a neighborliness that comes from living in a pioneer 
land, and a resourcefulness and determination that come 
from conquering it, that have largely died out in more 
thickly settled and more highly developed countries. The 
Alaskan of to-day is, if not the pioneer, but one genera- 
tion removed from him, and the indomitable spirit of the 



Life in Alaska 889 



pioneer is still a palpable presence in the Alaskan atmos- 
phere. In the Alaskan's vocabulary there seems to be no 
such word as " Impossible." If a thing needs to be done, 
that settles the matter. Time is not spent in considering 
whether it can be done. Thought is turned at once upon 
the " how," and though to an outsider the achievement 
seems an absolute impossibility, the Alaskan puts it 
through. Those hardy pioneers who wrestled with and 
conquered the White Pass, the White Horse Rapids, 
Thirtymile River, the Copper River canyon, the Valdez 
trail, the bogs of the tundra and the blizzards of the Arc- 
tic are not easily daunted, and their descendants are 
imbued with the same spirit. It is a delightful mental 
attitude to meet. It is cheery, hopeful, optimistic, and 
yet underneath is the iron determination that neither 
bends nor breaks, no matter what opposes it. 



CHAPTER XXVII 

business opportunities that alaska offers 
Smelters needed. The opening of the oil fields will bring 

MANY BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES. By-PRODUCTS OF FISHERIES 
AWAITING UTILIZATION. WaTER POWER CAN BE DEVELOPED. 
A BIG FIELD FOR PAPER PULP MILLS. GrEAT GRAZING AREA FOR 
REINDEER. MaNY OPENINGS FOR SMALL INDUSTRIES THAT 
REQUIRE LITTLE CAPITAL. 

The question is often asked, " What are the business 
opportunities in Alaska? " In reply to this a man well 
versed in Alaskan affairs said, " Almost every business 
possible in the States is possible in Alaska, for Alaska has 
nearly all the resources to be found in the United States." 

To a large extent this is true. Alaska has nearly all 
the minerals that are found in the United States, and 
some, such as tin, not found there. All the business enter- 
prises connected with mining therefore can be carried 
forward in Alaska. Its fish in quantity and variety equal, 
if not surpass, those of the rest of the country. Its furs 
easily outstrip them. Agriculture, of course, will never 
be on so large a scale, but it will become an increasingly 
important and successful industry. The cultivation of 
certain fruits is possible, but fruit raising cannot compete 
with the States. Cattle raising can become quite a profi- 
table industry and the making of butter and cheese and 
other dairy products has a bright future. There are vast 
timber areas that open up possibilities of lumbering. 

But those who wish to know about business prospects 
in Alaska usually desire more specific knowledge. For 

390 



Business Opportunities that Alaska Offers 391 

these there are many openings, some requiring much capi- 
tal, some little. 

One of the greatest needs of Alaska is smelters. All 
the ore mined there that needs smelting must now be 
shipped to the States, which is an extremely costly pro- 
cess. In addition, the finished product has often to be 
returned for Alaska's use. 

The single matter of tin, for instance, is an illustration. 
At present practically all the tin this country uses is im- 
ported from Europe. Even when mined at the Straits, 
as the tin regions of the Malay Archipelago are compre- 
hensively called, the tin is usually sent to Europe for 
redistribution, finally coming to this country and going on 
to Alaska for use in the canneries there. If the tin mined 
in Alaska could be smelted there, possibly also made into 
the tin cans needed there literally by the million, it is easy 
to see the saving effected for the American people on 
every can of salmon used or on any product for that mat- 
ter put up in tin, not only in Alaska, but in any part of our 
country. 

The coal for this smelting is right at hand. There is 
coal on the Seward Peninsula where tin is found and in 
the vicinity of the copper regions where smelters are 
greatly needed. 

With the government railroad providing cheaper 
transportation and fuel, quartz mining and the working 
of low grade ores will leap forward in the interior of 
Alaska and there will be openings in many of the side 
industries connected with this work. 

With the lifting of the ban on the oil fields a great oil 
industry with all its ramifications will spring into life. 
These resources are not accessible now, owing to govern- 
ment regulations, but it is only a question of time when 
they will be thrown open, so it behooves those interested 



392 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

in the subject to keep in touch with all legislation affect- 
ing them and all news about them. So long ago as 1913, 
15,682,000 gallons of crude oil, 1,735,000 gallons of 
naphtha, 661,000 gallons of illuminating and 150,000 
gallons of lubricating oil were shipped into Alaska. 
With the growth of the Territory this demand steadily 
grows, so it can be seen what a field is here right in Alaska 
itself for the products of the oil industry. 

The fish of Alaska open up opportunities in many direc- 
tions for business enterprises. Not only can one engage 
in the established industries, but there are delicious fish 
not yet on the market, such as the candlefish and the Atka 
mackerel, and many industries connected with the shell 
fish that have barely started. In addition there is much 
waste associated with the fishing industries that could be 
utilized. Cod livers and cod tongues are utilized else- 
where, but in Alaska they are thrown away. In Norway, 
cod caviar is made that is a source of much profit. Glue, 
fertilizer and such things could be made from the waste 
of the canneries. At a few canneries experiments are 
being undertaken in manufacturing chicken food as a by- 
product but this work is yet in its infancy. The canneries 
have such a short season and are so extremely busy during 
their season that they have little time for side issues. But 
there are openings here for those who will devote their 
chief attention to them. 

On the Pribilof Islands there is much waste matter that 
the government is now undertaking to utilize. But the 
government is always glad to welcome private enterprise 
in the development of Alaska's resources and by applica- 
tion to those in charge, openings might be found. For 
instance, the tough, leathery throats of the fur seals can 
be used in the manufacture of card cases and other small 
articles. There are quantities of these throats on the 



Business Opportunities that Alaska Offers 393 

islands and a business opening awaits for some one who 
will make use of them. 

Recently upon the Pribilof Islands large deposits of 
bone have been found suitable for fertilizers. These are 
said to be the largest known bone deposits in the world. 
Six thousand tons are in sight on the surface and the gov- 
ernment is desirous of contracting with private parties 
for their utilization. 

The development of the water power of Alaska has 
scarcely begun. In many places in Alaska are great 
water power resources due not only to rain, especially in 
the southeastern part, but to the mountain streams fed by 
the glaciers and snows that everywhere crown and clothe 
Alaska's countless mountains. One such enterprise is 
already started near Juneau but there is opportunity for 
many more and just as great need. 

This project at Juneau holds a permit from the Forestry 
Department for the powers of Speel River, which are 
capable of a development of one hundred thousand horse 
power continuously throughout the year at a lower cost 
than anywhere else except Norway. It is estimated that 
the cost of generating power at Speel River will be ap- 
proximately five dollars per horse power a year. When 
it is remembered that the cost of power' for electrical 
chemical purposes at Niagara is fifteen dollars per horse 
power a year, and at Keokuk, Iowa, twenty-three dollars, 
it will be realized what advantages Speel River presents 
at the very outset. But, in addition, the various raw ma- 
terials, such as lime, barytes, gypsum, copper and such 
things, are right at hand. Lime rock of excellent quality 
abounds in the neighboring mountains, and the iron sul- 
phides now washed into the ocean by the mines at Juneau 
yield readily to treatment in electrical furnaces and are 
converted into sulphur for pulp mills and iron for foun- 



394 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

dries, while from some of the concentrates of the mills, 
zinc and lead could be recovered as by-products. 

Among the supplies of great interest to the gold mines 
of the Territory are cyanide and powder. The demand 
for cyanide will increase as the cost is lowered, as it can 
be by using Alaska's water power. With the price of 
cyanide reduced, the treatment of low grade ores becomes 
more profitable and the treatment of low grade ores is one 
of Alaska's needs. 

This electric energy could be used also in the wood 
pulp industry and this is without doubt one of the coming 
industries of Alaska, and also in the drying of kelp for 
making fertilizer. The United States Bureau of Soils 
has established the fact that the great kelp beds of Alaska 
are an available and rich source of potash. 

The Forest Service, in connection with the United 
States Geological Survey, has installed recording gauges 
on all the streams suitable for water power throughout 
southeastern Alaska. A complete record is kept of the 
flow of these streams and is published for the use of the 
public. 

The kelp, which, as has been said, is found so prolifi- 
cally in Alaskan waters, offers business openings for those 
interested in this industry. In the Orkneys kelp farms 
are quite a source of livelihood for the people. 

The great timber resources of Alaska have scarcely 
been touched for business enterprises. In the interior the 
wood has been cut for fuel purposes. Along the coast 
there is here and there a sawmill. But no large timber 
industries have been started. 

The most important of these is the paper pulp business, 
and the forests of Alaska afford a favorable field for the 
development of this much needed industry. The numer- 
ous deep bays and protected inland passages offer cheap 



Business Opportunities that Alaska Offers 395 

transportation, and good harbors for ocean-going ships. 
Many suitable shore sites for manufacturing plants with 
available water power are to be found, together with an 
abundance of timber that on account of size and quality 
is valuable chiefly for this industry. 

There are many other openings in connection with the 
timber resources of the Territory. The fish canneries 
need packing boxes, and other fish industries need bar- 
rels. If these are brought from the States it means 
freight charges, besides the using up of space on the boats 
needed for the transportation of supplies not to be ob- 
tained in Alaska. These industries, therefore, would 
find a market right at hand for their products. 

Cattle grazing in certain parts of Alaska is quite practi- 
cable. Native grasses grow abundantly in many places. 
These can be stored in silos for winter use. It is believed 
also that angora goats can be profitably raised. On 
Kodiak dairying can be carried on successfully. William 
Dall a half century ago prophesied that the Aleutian 
Islands would become a great dairying centre of the 
Pacific coast. 

The raising of reindeer as an industry looms large. 
Stefansson believes it will in time be the leading industry 
of Alaska. There are almost unlimited grazing grounds 
for the deer, not only on the vast Arctic plain north of 
the Yukon and in the Seward Peninsula and to the north 
of this region, but also in the Kuskokwim country. Nuni- 
vak Island alone has a grazing area of approximately one 
thousand square miles and could support ten thousand 
deer. 

There are many minor industries that can be developed 
and which the country needs. The tourist trade will un- 
doubtedly increase rapidly in volume and there are open- 
ings in many lines that have to do with it. At such towns 



396 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

as Ketchikan, Wrangell, Juneau, Skagway, Cordova, a 
thriving business will undoubtedly grow in providing side 
trips for tourists. At all these towns are beautiful bays 
and inlets and passages not reached by the large steamers 
but well worth a visit. If small boats, either gas launches 
or sail-boats, were available at moderate prices, a thriving 
business of this sort could be developed. Tourists would 
make these towns their headquarters if they could get 
about to neighboring points easily and if a sojourn were 
made attractive for them. Many of these towns, which 
came into life as a result of the gold rush and whose pros- 
perity passed away with the disappearance of the stam- 
peders, could be as busy and successful during the summer 
season as a tourist resort as the popular places of the 
Atlantic coast. They have far more to offer in natural 
advantages. 

The wild fruits that grow in such abundance could be 
utilized for preserves, jellies and jams. Such an industry 
would become even more profitable if Alaska's tin could 
be smelted and made into cans right in the Territory. 

The volcanic ash to be found in many places is an excel- 
lent basis for cleansing agents. It can be had for the 
taking. Here, again, cans are needed, but wood, water 
power and other essentials are at hand. 

Alaska has a wonderful future commercially. In addi- 
tion to its own present home industries and the many that 
will develop, it will derive much benefit from the trade 
that will come to Seattle from Siberia. The shortest 
route to the north Pacific ports on the Asiatic side is by 
way of the Aleutian Islands. Russia has already sent 
representatives to look into the practicability of the route 
to the Kara Sea through the North Pacific Ocean. Radio 
stations will be established for the guidance of steamers 
that will ply permanently over this route. 



Business Opportunities that Alaska Offers 397 

Of this trade Mr. J. L. McPherson, of the Alaska Bu- 
reau of the Seattle Chamber of Commerce, says in an 
article entitled "Alaska, the Meeting Place with the 
Orient ": 

" Alaska, situated at the cross roads of the Pacific, mid- 
way between the great ocean ports of America and Asia, 
on the great circle and shortest ocean route, occupies a 
position of vital importance in the building of the great 
trade of the future between these countries. 

" The great circle route passes to the north of the 
southern islands of the Aleutian chain, but as the waters 
tributary to these islands are in part unsurveyed, the 
vessels now keep to the south of these islands. When 
this area is surveyed and aids to navigation installed, the 
shortest trans-Pacific route will cross north through the 
Aleutian Islands at Unimak Pass and back again to the 
south in the vicinity of Atka Island, the most western 
island of Alaska. A large coaling station will be located 
at Unalaska Bay to furnish a fuel supply from Alaska's 
great coal deposits, and at this point will grow a trading 
centre of importance — a meeting place for the American 
and the Asiatic. A second coaling station will probably 
be installed further to the westward with suitable harbor 
facilities. 

" In the great era of world trade following the war, 
our commercial opportunity will be with the East, Siberia 
and Asiatic Russia. This trade will not be ours without 
effort as we shall have able competitors with whom our 
rivalry must be friendly. Among these and more closely 
situated, as regards the southern and settled portions of 
Siberia, is Japan, with whom our business relationship 
must increase as the great trade of the Pacific expands. 
The business with this section of the East will be largely 
in manufactured articles. Where Japan has the raw 



398 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

products, competition will in time become keen and we 
shall be obliged to effect all possible economies in the cost 
of production. One of the first factors of cost to be re- 
duced will be transportation, and as a result the manufac- 
turer will endeavor to locate his plant close to the source 
of his raw products and tidewater. 

" Alaska is richly endowed with all raw products and 
all minerals required by the manufacturer. With the 
future expansion of this business it is very probable that 
the coast of Alaska will offer the most economical location 
for some of these plants, and that we will have in Alaska 
centres of manufacture as well as of trade for the trans- 
Pacific business. 

" In the pioneer development of northwestern Siberia, 
Alaska is exceptionally favored because of her proximity 
to this section of Asia which enables her to furnish the 
necessary adjacent base to the building of this trade. 
Northwestern Siberia is practically unknown and with 
the exception of small trading posts is a vast unpeopled 
region. The early development of such a country necessi- 
tates a close base of operation, for the trade is small and 
large vessels cannot successfully handle the business. 

** In early years, Nome developed a growing business 
with the Siberian outposts, which was carried on by 
schooners operating from Nome. This condition was 
only possible through the suspension of Russian customs' 
regulations. About 1907, the Russian government, ap- 
preciative of the great future possibilities of Siberia, 
adopted a policy which would result in Russianization of 
all phases of this development. As there is no customs' 
ofiice north of Petropavlosk on the Kamchatka Peninsula, 
a distance of more than fifteen hundred miles from Nome, 
the Russian government only had to enforce the customs' 
regulation to stop the business that Nome was gradually 



Business Opportunities that Alaska Offers 399 

building with these Siberian outposts, a business which 
Nome and the Alaskan people were especially fitted to 
handle as they had become experienced through handling 
like trade with the outposts of Alaska. 

" In order to further the Russianizing of this develop- 
ment, the Russian government subsidized a line of steam- 
ers to operate during the open season from Vladivostok 
north along the coasts of Siberia. As this distance is great 
and required an enormous tonnage of coal to furnish fuel 
for the round trip, and as the freight requirements of 
these small trading posts were limited, the venture proved 
a failure. After two or three seasons this unprofitable 
service was discontinued. The more settled portion of 
northern Siberia, in Yakutsk province, facing the Arctic 
Ocean, was entirely shut ofif from communication with the 
outside, except by a long, overland journey across the 
wastes of Northern Siberia, a journey that had to be 
made by pack trains in summer and by sleighs in winter. 
As a result of these conditions, this part of Siberia soon 
experienced a shortage of necessary supplies and mate- 
rials. 

" The Alaska Bureau of the Seattle Chamber of Com- 
merce presented these facts to the Russian Ambassador 
and Consul General Bogoiavlensky, who recommended to 
the Imperial government that the former trade conditions 
existing between Nome and Siberia again be permitted; 
that absolute free trade between Alaska and the northern 
and western shores of Siberia be allowed; and that south 
of Cape Navarin, all government agents be ex-officio 
customs' officers, which would result in practically the 
same measure of free trade as extended to the northern 
portions. Shortly after these recommendations reached 
Petrograd the Russian government was unseated. 

" With the establishment of more settled conditions in 



400 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

Russia and Siberia, the Alaska Bureau will again make 
an effort to bring about a renewal of these former trade 
conditions which were found essential to the pioneer de- 
velopment of this isolated section of Siberia, and which 
was of material trade advantage to Nome, especially 
equipped as it is to successfully handle this business. 

" Unless gold in paying quantities or some equally rich 
discovery is made to stimulate quick settlement, the 
growth of trade and transportation facilities in a new 
land is slow. The facilities which can be offered by Nome 
in building up this trade are of the greatest value in the 
development of Siberia. As this development grows and 
trade expands, it will become a field for larger oppor- 
tunities which can be centred from more distant bases. 
When this time arrives we shall have as competitors Japan 
and other countries. If we shall have succeeded in han- 
dling this business during the early stages along equitable 
lines, we need have nothing to fear from this future 
competition. 

" Alaska in her great future development will find an 
ever growing community of interests with Japan and the 
other great peoples of the East. America's outpost, 
Alaska, is Asia's nearest neighbor. Heretofore our com- 
munity of interest has only been evidenced in the seal 
industry, but this is bound to extend to the great fishing 
industries, to an interchange of raw products, and to the 
building of a trade relationship, which under broad, tact- 
ful direction is bound to assume enormous proportions. 

" In the building of this trade relationship and in the 
use of Alaska's great store of raw products, constant 
thought must be given to the future prosperity of Alaska 
and the welfare of her people." 



CHAPTER XXVIII 

the present complicated government 

Alaska's development hindered by inadequate and confused 
legislation. instances of injustice from which people 
SUFFER. Proposed remedies. Early indifference and 

MISGOVERNMENT. ChARLES SUMNER'S RECOMMENDATION. 

Benefit to the whole country of just legislation for 
Alaska. 

As has been shown, Alaska is a wondrously rich coun- 
try. Its development means industries and homes for 
the Territory itself and a great tide of useful and needed 
productions poured into other parts of the United States 
that v^all decrease the cost and add to the comfort of 
living. 

But at present the development of Alaska is held up 
by the laws governing it. 

Alaska's government is a motley affair. Franklin K. 
Lane, Secretary of the Interior, who understands the sit- 
uation admirably, calls it a patchwork. Many of the 
laws that govern it are passed by Congress. There is a 
territorial government, but here again Congress holds 
the controlling power, for there are many federal re- 
strictions and all laws passed by the home legislature 
must be transmitted to Congress and if disapproved by 
the legislative body at Washington they are void. To 
be sure, Alaska has a delegate at the national capital, but 
he has no vote; and to make an impression at Washing- 
ton without a vote one must be a rare creature indeed. 
His is but a voice crying in the wilderness. Thus in its 

401 



402 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

practical working out, Alaska is largely governed from 
Washington. But Washington is busy with many prob- 
lems that seem more important than Alaskan affairs, and 
so Alaska receives little interested attention. The adage 
of Russian days is not inapt, " Heaven is high and the 
Czar is distant." So far as any real understanding of 
its needs and conditions is concerned by the major part 
of those who control its legislative destiny, Alaska is in 
much the same condition to-day that it was during the 
time of the Russian occupancy. 

This distant lawmaking, inefficient as it is, is not all 
of the maladministration of Alaskan affairs. Many de- 
partments and bureaus have the carrying out of the laws 
passed. This results in almost inextricable confusion. 

There is a government for certain public lands and 
forests, another for other lands and forests. There is 
one procedure for making homestead, mineral and other 
land entries within the national forests; another proce- 
dure for making such entries in land outside the forest 
reserves. 

Certain islands along the southern coast of Alaska may 
be leased for fox farming by the Department of Com- 
merce; adjoining unreserved islands may not be leased, 
but may be acquired under the general land laws from 
the Department of the Interior. Still other islands are 
reserved for special purposes under the control of the 
Department of Agriculture. 

Vast areas in the forest reserves are entirely untim- 
bered, but are held under the regulations of the Forest 
Service, while timbered lands in other sections are unpro- 
tected. Some of the timbered islands off the coast are 
included within the forest reserves. Other islands equally 
well timbered are not. 

Homesteads within the forest reserves are surveyed 



The Present Complicated Government 403 

by the Forest Service without cost to the entryman. 
Homesteaders on unsurveyed lands outside the Forest 
Reserves must pay for their own surveys. It has hap- 
pened that three separate investigations of mineral claims 
have been made by field officers of the Forest Service, 
Land Office and Geological Survey. 

Roads and trails within the Forest Reserves are built 
by the Forest Service. Roads and trails outside these 
reserves are built by a commission of army officers. Still 
a third department having charge of road building has 
now been established by the Territorial Legislature. 

The appalling confusion that must necessarily follow 
from such overlapping authority on some questions and 
no authority at all on some others leads to all sorts of 
complications. 

A citizen who wanted to lease an island for fox farm- 
ing carried on a correspondence with three different de- 
partments for several months in an effort to learn which 
had jurisdiction and authority to make the lease. It was 
finally decided that none of them possessed this authority. 

It has taken as long as three years for a patent to be 
issued in uncontested land claims merely because of the 
lengthy procedure involved in securing the proper filling 
out of papers. Where any question arises over an entry 
which prevents the local register and receiver from issu- 
ing a final certificate, the papers in a homestead case after 
final proof is offered, must make at least two round trips 
between Washington and Alaska before patent can issue. 
If there is any contest, or any complication arises out of 
the claim, this long distance correspondence may be al- 
most indefinitely extended. 

An example of this is seen in the experience of a 
homesteader near Haines. He built a house and estab- 
lished residence in 1902. His claim was on unsurveyed 



404 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

and unreserved public lands. In 1908 he applied for a 
survey which he secured. In 1909 he made the necessary 
filing at Juneau and waited for his patent. In 1910, not 
having received it. he wrote the Commissioner asking 
about it. He received a reply stating that action had 
been deferred, waiting instructions from Washington. 
Later, the Commissioner referred the claim to the Geo- 
logical Survey, asking information as to whether any 
coal or petroleum deposits were embraced in the entry. 

In 1911 the Director of the Geological Survey wrote 
the Commissioner that no survey of the land had been 
made and that there were no data on the subject, but that 
he believed no deposits of coal or petroleum occurred in 
that vicinity. 

Finally the homesteader became anxious and wrote to 
the delegate at Washington, requesting his aid. The del- 
egate wrote to the Commissioner in Alaska and was in- 
formed that the lands embraced in this entry had been 
withdrawn for examination for coal and petroleum and 
that action would be taken on this entry as soon as infor- 
mation about the coal and petroleum was received. 

At last the homesteader received a patent nine years 
after he had settled on the land and after making his own 
survey at a cost of $700.00. It will be noted that though 
action was deferred for some time pending determination 
as to whether or not the land contained coal or petroleum, 
there was no field investigation of any kind and that when 
the patent was finally issued the Land Office really had 
no more actual information concerning the nature of the 
land than when the patent was first asked for. 

Patent for a mineral claim was four years in being 
secured, the papers making several trips between Alaska 
and Washington, and the Forestry Service, the Depart- 
ment of the Interior, and the Department of Agriculture, 



The Present Complicated Government 405 

as well as the Land Office, all having to take a hand in 
the matter. Had such work been centralized in Alaska 
under one bureau, the patent could have been secured 
in a few months. 

On the Aleutian Islands all matters relating to wild 
birds and game and the propagation of reindeer and fur- 
bearing animals are under the immediate jurisdiction of 
the Department of Agriculture; all matters pertaining 
specifically to fisheries and all aquatic life and to the 
killing of fur-bearing animals are under the Department 
of Commerce ; all matters other than these are under the 
charge of the Departments of Agriculture and Commerce. 
When it is remembered that the reservation is more than 
a thousand miles in length and that it is visited by a 
steamer about twice in a summer, it can be seen that the 
unfortunate inhabitant who sends a request for a permit 
to the wrong department may wait a year or more before 
he even discovers he has made a mistake. Several years 
may pass before he gets the permit for the work he may 
wish to undertake. 

This confusion and delay means loss both to the settler 
and government and greatly hampers the development of 
the Territory. 

There is as much interlocking, and consequently as 
great confusion in the administering of the game laws. 
The Department of Agriculture, the Department of Com- 
merce and the Bureau of Fisheries all have to do with 
the game of the country, yet when an agent of the Bureau 
of Education reported to Washington the discovery of a 
wholesale slaughter of walrus which would menace the 
food supply of the natives, it was decided by the Depart- 
ment of Agriculture that the killing was illegal but that 
there was no government machinery to prevent it. 

Another instance of this confusion in the application 



406 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

of the game laws is seen in the now historic incident of 
the black and brown bear. The brown bear is a game 
animal under the control of the Department of Agricul- 
ture, while the black bear is recognized by the law as a 
fur-bearing animal under the jurisdiction of the Depart- 
ment of Commerce. But very frequently black bears 
have brown cubs and to decide just to which department 
the care of a little brown cub belongs would necessitate 
a journey on the part of the game warden to the home 
of papa and mamma bear and a grave inspection of their 
color. If they happened to be the big Kodiak brown 
bear and resented such unwarranted intrusion upon fam- 
ily life — well, it is easy to see that the life of a game 
warden in Alaska might be all a bear and no skittles. 

Nor is this interlocking and overlapping of many gov- 
ernmental bureaus the only cause of confusion. In the 
individual department there is much distraction. The 
Land Office, one of the most vital to the fullest develop- 
ment of Alaska, is a fair sample. The administration of 
laws here is not plain and simple. They need many con- 
structions to arrive at their meaning. And the regula- 
tions and reservation orders are many, ambiguous, and 
not known to the settler. 

A mere list of some of these reservations suggests the 
labyrinths of technicality the settler may unconsciously 
wander into. Reservations as to specific areas are of the 
following kinds, though this list by no means includes all : 

For the purpose of protecting breeding grounds for 
native birds. 

For the propagation of reindeer and fur-bearing ani- 
mals and their protection. 

For the encouragement and development of fisheries. 

For the propagation of foxes and the protection of 
seals. 



The Present Complicated Government 407 

For the protection of moose. 

For the experimental work of the Department of Agri- 
culture. 

For the conduct of the work of the Bureau of Edu- 
cation. 

For the benefit of the Indian. 

For the establishment of sanitoriums. 

For the protection of certain grounds used by the 
Indians for fishing. 

For National Forest interests. 

For military and naval need. 

For power, reservoir, town-site, recreation, lighthouse 
requirements. 

For landing places for Indian canoes and other of their 
craft. 

For special timber necessities in connection with the 
building of railroads. 

For Forest Administrative sites. 

For areas surrounding hot springs and springs val- 
uable for curative and medicinal properties. 

For National monuments. 

For the construction of fish hatcheries. 

For particular fish streams and their catchment basins. 

For rights of way for road purposes along shore lines. 

For lands containing coal, oil and petroleum. 

For all streams used by merchantable sea-going fish, 
either for spawning grounds, or as a passage to spawning 
grounds. 

For streams which may be used for commercial pur- 
poses such as the transportation of light water craft, 
logs and so forth. 

As can be seen, these reservations are rather appalling 
to the man or woman contemplating taking up a home- 
stead, and though decision in regard to some is simple, 



408 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

others, such as those on navigable streams and those used 
by sea-going merchantable fish, may lead the land claim- 
ant into contact with two or three departments, the sev- 
eral bureaus concerned, the local officers in Alaska, and 
the legal officers of the departments and bureaus, until 
the mass of decision and correspondence that ensues 
astounds the settler and probably so confuses him that 
he will not take up the land. 

In fact, there is a degree of uncertainty attending the 
perfection of a title to land with the exception of mining 
claims, and as to what areas are subject to appropriation, 
that discourages if it does not prevent the taking up of 
land by settlers. 

The conservation laws present another field in which 
Alaskans believe reforms are necessary. There is no 
confusion or interlocking of authority here, but there is, 
from the point of view of the Alaskan, prohibition. The 
feeling in Alaska in regard to the coal situation runs 
higher perhaps than on any other subject. The tensity 
is shown by the fact that several years ago, the citizens 
of Cordova dumped a quantity of Canadian coal from the 
wharf as a protest against regulations that compelled 
them to buy fuel from a foreign country when there was 
an abundance of it almost under their feet. This inci- 
dent has gone down in Alaskan history as the Cordova 
Coal Party. 

The Alaskan contends that the present leasing system 
for coal lands is equivalent to absentee landlordism, which 
has never proven a success anywhere ; that at present the 
owners of the coal lands, or in other words, the govern- 
ment, is far away and knows little of the actual conditions 
in Alaska. That there is little personal knowledge of 
Alaska among the law makers in Washington and like- 
wise little generally enlightened public opinion about it 



The Present Complicated Government 409 

to demand intelligent action on their part, is a matter of 
history. In 1900, when the law-making body at the 
national capital felt something must be done to appease 
the indignation of Alaskans at the neglect and indiffer- 
ence shown for their needs, an act was passed extending 
to Alaska the provisions of the United States' coal laws. 
According to these coal laws, none but subdivided, 
marked and platted lands could be taken up by a claim- 
ant. Yet at that time there was not a land survey in 
the whole of Alaska. This is but one sample of many 
that shows the kind of treatment Alaska has had at the 
hands of the legislators at Washington. So that absen- 
tee landlordism in regard to the coal lands does not 
appeal to the people of the Territory, who are on the 
ground and know that intimate personal knowledge is 
needed to frame proper legislation about the important 
question of coal. 

Alaskans further contend that many of the present 
specific government regulations about the mining of the 
coal are impracticable, and that others, so far as actual 
operations go, take the management of the business out 
of the operator's hands to such an extent that no experi- 
enced coal man would undertake to mine coal under the 
lease the government gives, with any hope of having an 
assured and profitable business; or, in other words, that 
the coal operator under a government lease is at the will 
and whim of the legislators in Washington, and that 
knowing their ignorance of Alaskan affairs, he feels his 
business would be on an exceedingly unstable foun- 
dation. 

An editorial in the Alaska Daily Empire of Juneau 
well voices the sentiments of Alaskans on this point. It 
saiys, " The resources of Alaska are not valuable to the 
government from a landlord's standpoint. They are only 



410 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

valuable to the government and the people of the United 
States when utilized and giving profitable employment 
to men and women who thereby are given opportunity 
to add to the producing and consuming powers of the 
country, and to the volume of its industry and trade. 
Alaska is most valuable to the United States in the market 
which she affords for $30,000,000 or more of their 
products, and the gold, foodstuffs and other products 
which she sends for their use. Every year that Alaska's 
resources are kept locked up is therefore a year of waste. 

" If title to the resources of Alaska is to remain in the 
Federal government, no territorial or State legislature 
or referendum to the people within the present Territory 
of future State or States can have any authority over 
them. Federal ownership means Federal government, 
— government from Washington. Private property is 
subject to the laws and will of the commonwealth, there- 
fore private ownership means control by the people who 
live in the vicinity of the resources and know what they 
mean and how they should be utilized for the good of 
the public. Government from Washington means gov- 
ernment by those who are aliens as far as Alaska is con- 
cerned, — government by those whose interest in Alaska 
is a theory. Self-government means government by 
those who are vitally interested in the Territory and cir- 
cumstances and conditions surrounding it. and who have 
knowledge gained of interest and experience." 

Over against these views of home rule are the beliefs 
of the adherents of the present system, who maintain that 
it is intended as a safeguard against monopoly, and to 
keep the coal and other resources now conserved in the 
hands of the people, so that supply and cost to them can 
always be regulated for their own benefit ; that the regu- 
lations governing the mining are no more severe than 



The Present Complicated Government 411 

many state laws governing this industry and that the man 
who wants to do what is honest and just has nothing to 
fear from government supervision. 

The oil lands have been completely withdrawn and 
until some legislative action is taken in regard to them, 
they are absolutely useless, and all the various petroleum 
products that Alaska needs, and of which her consump- 
tion is great, must be shipped in. 

The folly of this sort of conservation and how it affects 
not only Alaska but the welfare of the whole country 
was brought out during our war with Germany by Mr. 
Peabody, Chairman of the Committee on Coal Produc- 
tion of the National Council of Defense. He said, in a 
hearing before the United States Senate : 

" Any laws that can be passed that will loosen up the 
reserve fuel and oil supplies of Alaska should be adopted. 
We are shipping every ton of coal we can possibly send 
to the West coast. It takes ninety-two days for a car 
to go from the eastern coal fields to California and re- 
turn. It is a most horrible misuse of equipment." 

The Alaskans do not wish the resources of the Terri- 
tory to be monopolized or wasted, any more than do the 
legislators at Washington, who say that in all these con- 
servation measures they are merely saving these valuable 
resources for the people. But as ex-President Taft has 
said, " Conservation does not mean complete with- 
drawal," which is the practical result of present laws, and 
Alaskans want these laws so amended that though this 
wealth is preserved from monopolies it will still be of 
use to the people. At present, monopolies are really 
being served by the conservation laws, for this great 
wealth of Alaska cannot be put on the market to keep 
prices down. 

The Alaskans maintain that these matters can be 



412 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

attended to through their own legislative body more 
intelligently than they can be attended to in distant 
Washington. 

The legislative power of the Territory itself is vested 
in a Territorial Legislature consisting of a Senate and a 
House of Representatives. The Senate consists of eight 
members, two from each of the four judicial divisions 
into which Alaska is now divided. The House of Repre- 
sentatives consists of sixteen members, four from each of 
the four judicial divisions. The term of each member 
of the Senate is four years, one member from each 
judicial division being elected every two years. The 
term of each member of the House of Representatives 
is two years. 

The legislature convenes biannually at Juneau on the 
first Monday of March in odd years, and the length of 
the session is limited to sixty days, but the governor is 
empowered to call an extra session. 

The executive power is vested in the governor, who is 
appointed by the President for a term of four years by 
and with the advice of the United States Senate. 

That Alaskans are quite fit to govern themselves prop- 
erly is shown by the first acts passed by the Territorial 
legislature, which included women's suffrage, prohibition, 
and appropriations for schools, roads, humanitarian pur- 
poses, the national defense and fish hatcheries. Under 
Federal control, many schools were closed during the 
winter. Now that the Territory has taken up their main- 
tenance they are kept open the entire school year. Such 
legislation does not seem like the work of those incapable 
of managing their own affairs, and points to a govern- 
ment that would work to the best interests of the Terri- 
tory were it given a freer hand. 

That something should be done to straighten out this 



The Present Complicated Government 413 

confusion and interlocking of authority all who have 
the interests of Alaska at heart are agreed. If the Terri- 
tory is yet too young to be entirely trusted, a directorate 
has been suggested as an improvement upon present 
methods. Secretary Lane has sponsored this end of it. 
He says : 

" Alaska's remoteness alone makes anything like super- 
vision by bureaus located at Washington more or less 
perfunctory and superficial. What we now have in 
Alaska is little more than a number of independent and 
unrelated agents, acting largely upon their own initiative, 
each attending to some special branch of police work, 
and no branch adequately organized to cope with its own 
problems without even attempting to coordinate its work 
with that of the other branches. 

" But the task of administering the laws relating to 
the disposal and development of the public domain and 
resources in Alaska is also a task of construction. The 
problem is the settlement and development of the country 
and of all its resources to the best advantage. Each 
branch of work now under a different supervision is a 
part of one and the same problem. It is a huge task 
that is ahead, but it is a single task and to undertake it 
successfully it must be put into the hands of a single 
authoritative directorate. 

" To secure effectiveness, we must eliminate the short- 
comings of the present system, its delays, red tape, cir- 
cumlocution, divisions and overlapping of authority, and 
ineffectiveness, as well as the discouragements it offers 
to settlers whom we want to encourage, and substitute 
machinery that will be direct, prompt and certain in its 
operation. 

" The members of the proposed development board 
would be appointed by the President and approved by 



414 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 



the Senate. Their salaries would be sufficient to enable 
men of ability to devote themselves exclusively to the 
work in hand. This board would have its headquarters 
in Alaska and its members would live in the Territory. 
It would have authority to appoint its own agents and 
to supervise their work. The board would make its re- 
ports and be directly responsible for its actions to a single 
cabinet officer, the Secretary of the Interior, whose 
department is most closely identified with Alaskan af- 
fairs and probably best equipped by experience and 
organization to handle such matters. 

" It is proposed and urged that the Board should 
take over such authority, now exercised by various de- 
partments and bureaus, as may be necessary to give it 
supervision over practically the entire public domain and 
all the natural resources of Alaska, and control of such 
activities as are closely related and essential to the devel- 
opment of th^^ physical resources of the country. 

" It is doubtful if the proposed consolidation of Alas- 
kan administration agencies should make any change in 
the work of purely scientific and investigative bureaus, 
whose activities in Alaska are not localized, and are car- 
ried on with the same organization and machinery, and 
as a part of general work of national meaning and appli- 
cation, which necessitates highly expert knowledge, 
equipment and cooperation. The information and re- 
sults attained by these bureaus should be placed in the 
hands of the Development Board for local use and appli- 
cation, just as it is placed in the hands of State and local 
administrative authorities elsewhere for application and 
use. 

" It is not suggested of course that there should be any 
change in the authority or activities in Alaska of the 
Department of Justice, the Treasury or the Post Office 



The Present Complicated Government 415 

Departments, or the general functions of the Army or 
Navy Departments there. Collection and delivery of the 
mails, collection of the public revenue, maintenance of 
the Army and Navy and armed defenses, are functions 
so purely national in scope, regardless of where any par- 
ticular act in connection with them may be performed, 
that there would be no justification for suggesting divi- 
sion of these duties, more than there would be for sug- 
gesting that the cost of any of these services should be 
locally apportioned and assessed. Good mail service in 
Alaska is as important to the people of all the States as 
to their correspondents in Alaska. Although the Army 
and Navy Departments may spend large sums of money 
for the defense of Alaska, these expenditures should no 
more be charged to the Territory locally than to Maine 
or Florida. 

" From time to time new laws and new policies must 
be adopted by Congress to enable the fullest fruition of 
the promises of Alaska. Under present conditions 
we have recommendations from numerous sources for 
changes in the laws and policies. These recommenda- 
tions have to do, usually, with only a single phase of the 
big problem of how the country may best and quickest 
be developed. Each bureau or department charged with 
only certain duties and responsibilities, recommends 
changes in the laws affecting the particular function it 
performs. There is no place where these various chang- 
ing needs of the country are brought together, correlated 
and framed into a consistent, workable, general program 
or policy, which considers in all its aspects the needs of 
the whole country. Such a duty the proposed Board 
would perform. 

" Alaska can be made self-supporting within a very 
few years, as soon as conditions are created which will 



416 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

enable settlement and development and produce revenues. 
So far, the government has done little, aside from care 
of the seal herd, to bring returns. It is unreasonable to 
expect revenue from an undeveloped and unsettled 
country. 

" With disbursements and receipts passing through one 
and the same channel, with a broad concept of needs and 
conditions on the part of a single responsible body, and 
with revenues and expenditures reported to and by this 
Board, there could be presented to Congress each year a 
comprehensive Alaskan budget which should make legis- 
lation simpler and more intelligent. 

" But Alaskan resources must be dealt with as a whole, 
as a single problem of large management." 

This idea of a centralized local body is surely a step 
forward. It would efficiently and at once put affairs in 
the Territory on a business basis, and until the time that 
the government at Washington feels that the Territory 
could assume full management and responsibility, it 
would certainly direct Alaskan affairs better than they 
are being handled at present. 

Mr. J. L. McPherson, Secretary of the Alaskan Bureau 
of the Seattle Chamber of Commerce, in speaking of the 
government Alaska needs, says : 

" Alaska, ' the land of gold,' is to-day a land of food 
and metals. Last year the Alaska production in metals 
was greater in value than that produced in the state of 
California, while in fish food Alaska produced in excess 
of the combined production of Washington, Oregon, 
British Columbia and California. Alaska, in 1917, 
shipped out products of a value in excess of $97,000,000, 
over four times its greatest gold production for any one 
year. 

*' Despite this wonderful showing, and the fact that 



The Present Complicated Government 417 

the government was employing over five thousand men 
in the construction of the Alaskan government railroad, 
the population of Alaska declined over four thousand, 
a condition unknown in the development of any country 
in the world's history. There is a reason for this decline 
of population and a remedy. The reason is that our 
present policy toward Alaska's development is a policy 
of restriction, instead of the policy of encouragement 
necessary to the upholding of a frontier land. We are 
simply creaming the rich resources of Alaska without 
doing anything towards an industrial development and 
the building of a permanent citizenry. Under such con- 
ditions, Alaska can never be other than a source of 
national weakness. Her enormous resources are already 
proven so great as to warrant a strong prosperous citi- 
zenry that will make Alaska a source of ever increasing 
national strength. 

" The remedy can be briefly and concisely stated : 

" First — The full measure of home rule accorded to 
all the western Territories. No frontier people ever dem- 
onstrated their ability to govern themselves as have the 
people of Alaska. 

" Second — Coordinated direction of the administra- 
tive functions of all Federal bureaus having to do with 
Alaskan resources. These functions cannot be directed 
by men at desks four thousand to six thousand miles dis- 
tant, who know nothing of Alaskan conditions. 

" Third — The enactment of laws affecting land titles 
and the development of Alaska's resources that will en- 
courage rather than restrict — laws that are only open 
to one construction; that will protect against monopoly 
and that will provide for the development of Alaska's 
rich resources, so as to assure a strong and prosperous 
citizenry." 



418 Alaska, Our Beautiful Northland 

From the very beginning of government control, 
Alaska has received inadequate and unintelligent atten- 
tion. Its purchase was widely jeered and hooted. It 
was called Icebergia, Walrussia, Polaria and other con- 
temptuous names. " What shall we do with it ? Make 
it a penal colony? " was asked. And so great was the 
misapprehension about it that an editor of a leading paper 
said, " No energy of the American people will be sufficient 
to make mining profitable in sixty degrees north latitude. 
Ninety-one one-hundredths of the territory is absolutely 
worthless." 

For thirty years the country had practically no gov- 
ernment. At first a military governor was appointed and 
a few troops were sent to the Territory. Later, these 
were withdrawn. During this period when an outbreak 
from the Indians was feared in the southeastern part, the 
British government was called on for aid. 

In 1881 so dire was the extremity of the settlers that 
the following appeal was sent to Congress by the resi- 
dents of the southeastern part : " There are no courts of 
record by which title to property may be established or 
conflicting claims adjudicated, or estates administered. 
or naturalization or other privileges acquired, debts col- 
lected or the commercial advantages of laws secured. 
Persons accused of crimes or misdemeanors are subject 
to the arbitrary will of a military or naval commander, 
thrown into prison and kept there for months without 
trial, or punished by imprisonment upon simple accusa- 
tion and without verdict of a jury." 

Despite the clear picture of injustice and neglect here 
presented little was done. In 1883, Alaska was still but 
a customs district with a collector and a few deputies. 
The laws were but the regulations made by the Secretary 
of the Treasury, and for protection the people had to 



The Present Complicated Government 419 

depend upon a single war vessel, the crew of which often 
had to perform police duty among the settlements of the 
Alexander Archipelago. 

Finally a bill was passed in Congress by which a civil 
government was given. A governor was appointed, a 
district court established and four commissioners named. 
But actual beneficial results were almost nil. It was not 
until the Klondike rush that the government at Washing- 
ton really took Alaska seriously. Even then compara- 
tively little was done in comparfson with the need. It is 
only within the last decade that any legislative action 
worthy the name has been taken and this is so limited in 
contrast with what is required, and, as has been shown, 
so confused and contradictory, that it yet does not meas- 
ure up to what Alaskans feel they should have. 

In his great speech in the Senate, when the purchase 
was under discussion, Charles Sumner said : 

" Your most important endowment will be the repub- 
lican government, a source of wealth more inexhaustible 
than fisheries. Bestow such a government and you will 
bestow what is better than all you can receive, whether 
quintals of fish, sands of gold, choicest of furs, or most 
beautiful of ivory." 

A republican government in its democratic American 
sense is what Alaska needs. Given this, it will gener- 
ously make a return that will enrich the world. But 
until it does receive legislative justice there should be no 
cessation in the agitation for the improvement of present 
methods. The people of the whole country, by an intelli- 
gent interest in the matter and an insistent demand, can 
help forward the work. It is to their advantage to do 
so, for what helps one helps all. The honest and con- 
structive development of Alaska's resources will benefit 
every citizen and every section of our great country. 

THE END 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Ballou, M. M. : New Eldorado. 
Bancroft, H. H. : History of Alaska. 

Brooks, A. H. : Mineral Resources of Alaska. (Government Re- 
port.) 

The Mount McKinley Region. (Government Report.) 

Browne, B. : Conquest of Mount McKinley. 

Burroughs, John : Far and Near. 

Dall, William H. : Alaska and its Resources. 

De Windt, H. : Through the Gold Fields of Alaska. 

Dole, N. H. : Our Northern Domain. 

Dunn, R. : The Shameless Diary of an Explorer. 

GiLMAN, Mrs. Isabel Ambler : Alaskaland. 

Gordon, G. B. : In the Alaskan Wilderness. 

Over the Last Frontier. 

Greely, a. W. : Handbook of Alaska. 

Harriman Alaska Expedition. 

Heilprin, Angelo : Alaska and the Klondike. 

Herron, Joseph : Explorations in Alaska. 

Higginson, Ella : Alaska, The Great Country. 

James, Bushrod : Alaska, Its Neglected Past, Its Brilliant Future. 

MuiR, John : Travels in Alaska. 

Powell, Addison : Trailing and Camping in Alaska. 

Schwatka, F. : Along Alaska's Great River. 

SciDMORE, E. R. : Alaska and the Sitkan Archipelago. 

Scull, E. M. : Hunting in the Arctic and Alaska. 

Sheldon, Charles : The Wilderness of the Upper Yukon. 

Stuck, Hudson : Voyages on the Yukon and Its Tributaries. 

Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled. 

The Ascent of Denali. 

Underwood, J. J. : Alaska : An Empire in the Making. 



421 



INDEX 



Abercrombie Canyon, 167. 

A B Mountain, 56. 

Afognak, 173. 

Agate, 183. 

Agricultural College, 146, 332. 

Agriculture, II, 320-332. 

Alaska Anthracite Railroad, 

359- 

Alaska Central Railroad, 345. 

Alaska Derby, 202, 203. 

Alaska Engineering Commission, 
142, 173. 348. 

Alaska-Gastineau Mine, 47, 48, 
272. 

Alaska- Juneau Mine, 47, 48, 
272. 

Alaska Legislature, 223, 412. 

Alaska Northern Railroad Com- 
pany, 345. 

Alaska Peninsula, 173, 175, 178, 
179, 232, 269, 279, 286, 287. 

Alaska Road Commission, 155, 

337- 
Alert Bay, 21. 
Aleutian Indians, or Aleuts, 

235, 309, 310, 361, 362. 
Aleutian Islands, 13, 173, 175, 

179-184, 232, 309, 331, 368, 

369, 396, 397, 405- 
Alexander Archipelago, 39. 
Amber, 183. 
Anchorage, 15, 173, 280, 348, 

349- 

Andreanof or Andreanofski, 183. 

Andreafski, 191. 

Antimony, 8. 

Anvik, 190. 

AnvU Creek, 196. 

Anvil Mountain, 198. 

Arctic Brotherhood, 56, 105. 

Area, 12. 

Atka, 183, 303, 392, 397. 

Atlin, 72, 75. 

Atlin Lake, 52, 69, 74, 75. 

Attu, 183, 363. 

Auk Lake, 52. 



B 

Baird Glacier, 167. 
Baker, Mount, 19. 
Baltimore Glacier, 172. 
Baranof, Alexander, 228, 239- 

243, 365- 

Barnard Glacier, 172. 

Barnard, Lieutenant J. J., 187, 
188. 

Barytes, 8, 289. 

Beach, Rex, 138. 

Bear, 259, 260. 

Beaver, 9. 

Beaver (town), 138. 

Beleke, 298. 

Bennett, Lake, 69, 71, 118, 119. 

Bering River, 280, 281, 359. 

Bering, Vitus, 229-233. 

Bethel, 215. 

Bettles, 138, 208, 209. 

Big Salmon, 92. 

Birds, 263-267. 

Bluestone District, 200. 

Bluff, 193. 

Bogslop Islands, 180. 

Bompas, Bishop, 131, 367. 

Bonanza Creek (Yukon Terri- 
tory), 121, 124, 125, 128. 

Boundary, 243, 247, 248. 

British Columbia, 19. 

Broad Pass, 355. 

Browne, Belmore, 354. 

Bryn Mawr Glacier, 172. 

Bureau of Education for the 
Natives, 369-382. 

Bureau of Mines, 289-292. 

Burroughs, John, 3, 275. 



Calico Bluff, 133. 
California, 241, 243. 
Campbell, Robert, 96, 97. 
Canadian Pacific Steamers, 15, 

16. 
Candle, 199, 200, 203, 269. 
Candlefish, 302, 303, 392. 



42;i 



424 



Index 



Cape Prince of Wales, 185, 195. 

Cape York, 200. 

Carcross, 71, 72, 84. 

Caribou, 257, 258. 

Caribou Crossing, 71. 

Carmack, George, 93, 113, 114. 

Caro, 138, 155, 210. 

Catherine Archipelago, 183. 

Catherine II, 183, 229. 

Cascade Mountains, 19. 

Cassiar Bar, 92. 

Chandalar, 209, 210, 277. 

Chena, 143. 

Childs Glacier, 167, 357, 358. 

Chilkat Indians, 97. 

Chilkoot Pass, 56, 57, 115, 116. 

Chirikof, Alexei, 229, 230. 

Chitina, 165, 166. 

Chrome ore, 8, 287. 

Chugach National Forest, 255. 

Cinnabar, 8, 214, 288. 

Circle City, 100, 133, 269, 284, 

285. 
Clams, 305. 
Climate, 12. 
Coal, 8, 88, 130, 211, 214, 280, 

283. 
Coast Range, 164. 
Cod, 300, 392. 
Coldfoot, 138, 209. 
College Fiord, 171, 172. 
Columbia Glacier, 171. 
Colville River, 97, 211. 
Commerce, 11, 410-419. 
Controller Bay, 281, 286, 359. 
Cook, Captain James, 37, 180, 

193, 219, 237, 238. 
Cook, Frederick A., 353, 354. 
Cook Inlet, 173, 175, 176, 238, 

243, 287, 349, 368. 
Cooperative stores, 372, 373. 
Copper, 8, 88, 211, 214, 277-280. 
Copper Centre, 165. 
Copper River, 164, 165, 235, 

288, 331. 
Copper River and Northwestern 

Railroad, 166, 278, 356-359- 
Cordova, 115, 152, 155, 167- 

169, 278, 396, 408. 
Council, 199, 359. 
Cross Sound, 219. 

D 
Dall, William Henry, 189, 294, 
352, 383. 395- 



Davidson Glacier, 53. 

Dawson, 54, 87, loo-iio, 119, 

122. 
Dawson, Dr. George, 119. 
Dead Horse Gulch, 66, 117. 
Delta River, 160. 
Denver Glacier, 56. 
Dewey, Mount, 56. 
Dikeman, 216. 
Diomede Islands, 184, 369. 
Discovery, 78. 
Disenchantment Bay, 237. 
Dog Race, 202, 203. 
Douglas, 47. 
Dredging, 79, 108, 199, 201, 

216, 271, 272. 
Drum, Mount, 164. 
Duncan, William, 32-36. 
Dutch Harbor, 12, 181, 182. 
Dyea, 56, 116. 

E 

Eagle, 12, 131, 132, 337. 

Eagle Nest Rock, 93. 

Edgecumbe, Mount, 220, 236. 

Eldorado Creek, Yukon Terri- 
tory, 121. 

Endicott Mountains, 208. 

English Bay, 20. 

English Explorations, 236, 237. 

Eskimos, 195, 196, 360-363, 
374-380. 

Etolin, Governor, 244. 



Fairbanks, 54, 143-152, I55, 
156, 269, 277, 284, 325, 327- 

329, 383, 385- 
Fairweather, Cape, 238. 
"Fifty-four, Forty, or Fight," 36. 
Fiftymile River, 97. 
Fire Island, 181. 
Fish, 9, 308-319. 
Five Finger Rapids, 94. 
Flat City, 216. 
Flat Creek, 216. 
Fort Egbert, 132. 
Fort Gibbon, 140, 150, 155. 
Fort Reliance, 100, iii. 
Fort Selkirk, 96, 98, 1 12. 
Fort Simpson, 33. 
Fort Victoria, 19. 
Fort Yukon, 97, 100, 135, 210, 

383. 



Index 



425 



Fortymile, loo, 112, 129-13 1, 

269, 331. 
Fox (town), 154. 
Fox farming, 71, 315, 316. 
Fox Islands, 183. 
Fraser Falls, 100. 
Frederick Sound, 45. 
French explorations, 238. 
Furs, 9, 308-319. 



Galloway cattle, 326. 
Gannett, Henry, 3. 
Gastineau Channel, 47, 53. 
Georgeson, Prof. C. C., 324. 
Glacier Bay, 13, 52. 
Gold, 7, 210, 214, 215, 268-277. 
Gold Bottom Creek, 113. 
Gold Creek Canyon, 50. 
Gold Run Creek, 121. 
Golovin Bay, 196. 
Government Railroad, 142, 143, 

151, .331, 343-355- 
Graphite, 8. 

Greek Church, 221, 222. 
Griggs, Robert F., 177. 
Gulf of Georgia, 19, 20. 
Gypsum, 8. 

H 

Haines, 54, 323, 366. 

Halibut, 300. 

Harper, Arthur, 98, 100, iii, 

134, 352. 
Harriman Expedition, 3. 
Harriman Fiord, 171, 172. 
Harrisburg, 48. 
Harris, Richards, 48, 273. 
Harvard Glacier, 172. 
Hawaii, 182. 
Hayes, Mount, 160. 
Hecate Strait, 37. 
Henderson, Robert, 113, 114. 
Herring, 301, 302. 
Holmes, Joseph, 291, 292. 
Holy Cross Mission, 190, 367. 
Holyoke Glacier, 172. 
Hootalinqua or Hootalinkwa 

River, 92. 
Hot Springs, 139, 205. 
Hudson Bay Company, 19, 20, 

96, 97, I35> 141. 210, 243. 
Hunker Creek, 121. 
Husky, 335. 



Hydah Indians, 28, 29, 39, 361. 
Hydraulicking, 108, 199, 271, 

272. 
Hydro-roagnesite, 75, 76. 



Icy Strait, 219. 

Iditerod, 150, 215-217, 270. 

Ikogmute, 190. 

Iliamna, Mount, 176. 

Indians, 6, 360-382. 

Indian Park, 226. 

Indian River, 226. In Yukon 

Territory, 113. 
Innoko, 215, 216. 
Inside Passage, 15, 20-42, 384. 
Iron, 8. 



Jackson, Sheldon, 224, 368, 374. 

Jade, 211. 

Japanese Current, 322, 384. 

Juan de Fuca, 19, 37. 

Juneau, 47-49, 269, 272, 273, 

276, 277, 299, 386, 393, 396. 
Juneau, Joseph, 48, 273. 
Juneau, Mount, 47. 
Juvenal, Father, 364, 365. 

K 

Kaltag, 189. 

Kamchatka, 182, 309. 

Kantishna River, 212. 

Kasan, 29, 39. 

Katalla, 286. 

Katmai, Mount, 2, 176-179. 

Kelp, 394. 

Kenai, Lake, 347. 

Kenai Peninsula, 173, 269, 279, 

282, 287, 288, 346, 347. 
Kennicott Mines, 8. 
Kennicott, Robert, 188, 189. 
Ketchikan, 37, 38, 269, 279, 300, 

366, 396. 
Keystone Canyon, 170. 
Klondike River, 107, iii, 113. 
Knik Arm, 349. 
Kobuk River, 210, 368. 
Kodiak, 1 73-175, I77, 232, 236, 

243, 298, 300, 322, 325, 326, 

331, 395- 
Kokrines, 186. 
Kolmakof, 214, 215. 
Koserefsky, 190. 



426 



Index 



Kotzebue Sound, 199, 200. 
Kougarok District, 200. 
Koyukuk River, 187, 207, 210, 

270. 
Kuskokwim Country, 212-215, 

269, 283, 288, 331, 367, 368, 

395- 
Kuskokwim River, 191, 212, 213, 

288. 
Kwikpak, 141, 186. 



Lead, 8. 

Lebarge, Lake, 91, 119. 

Le Barge, Michael, 91. 

Le Conte Glacier, 41, 45. 

Lewes River, 97, 119. 

Lewis Lake, 84. 

Llewellyn Glacier, 79, 81-83. 

Log cabin, 69. 

Lookout Mountain, 208. 

Lovers' Lane, 226. 

Lukeen, Ivan, 214. 

Lukeen's Fort, 215. 

Lynn Canal, 15, 53. 

M 

Macmillan River, 99. 
Magnesite, 75, 76. 
Malamute, 334, 335. 
Malaspina, Alejandro, 237. 
Malaspina Glacier, 4, 13, 219. 
Marble, 8, 285. 
Marsh, Lake, 119. 
Matanuska, 280, 281, 325, 349. 
Mayo, Alfred, 100, 134, 352. 
McDonald, Archdeacon, 136, 

367- 
McKinley, Mount, 4, 142, 349- 

355- 

McQuesten, Jack, 100, iii, 134. 

Mendenhall Glacier, 51. 

Metlakatla, 32, 35, 36. 

Midnight Sun, 134, 135. 

Miles Canyon, 84, 85, 1 19. 

Miles Glacier, 167, 357, 358. 

Minto, 96. 

Mink farming, 318, 319. 

Missions, 33-36, 131, 136. Bap- 
tist, 368 ; Congregational, 368 
Church of England, 367 
Methodist, 181, 366, 368 
Moravian, 215, 367; Pres- 
byterian, 223, 224, 366, 368; 



Protestant Episcopal, 136, 

139, 142, 157, 190, 367; 

Roman Catholic, 190, 367 ; 

Russian, 190; Society of 

Friends, 368. 
Molybdenum, 8. 
Monroe Doctrine, 244. 
Moose, 258, 259. 
Moosehide, 107. 
Mount McKinley National Park, 

349-351- 
Muir Glacier, 13, 52, 219. 
Muir, John, 3, 13, 272. 
Muldrow Glacier, 350, 354. 
Murray, Alexander, 135. 



N 

National Geographic Society, 

176, 177. 
Near Islands, 183. 
Nelson Schools, 387. 
Nenana, 142, 150, 355. 
Nenana Coal Fields, 280, 282, 

355- 
Nome, 12, 15, 155, 185, 192- 

203, 217, 269, 359, 367, 385, 

398-400. 
Nome River, 199. 
Nootka, 236. 
Norfolk Sound, 241. 
Northern Commercial Company, 

134- 
Norton Bay, 192. 
Novo Arkhangelsk, 241. 
Nugget Creek, 51. 
Nulato, 187-189, 207. 
Nunivak Island, 184, 395. 



O 

Obsidian, 1S3. 
Ogilvie, 100, 112. 
Ogilvie, William, 57, 108, 131. 
Okalee Channel, 359. 
Olympic Mountains, 17, 19. 
Oolichan, 302, 303. 
Oomiak, 195. 
Oregon, 36. 



Parker, Herschel, 354. 
Pedro, Felix, 144, 145. 
Pelagic sealing, 310, 311. 



Index 



427 



Pelly River, 40, 69, 96-99. 
Peter the Great, 229, 244. 
Petersburg, 44, 45. 
Petroleum, 211, 285. 
Philippine Islands, 12, 182. 
Pioneers' Home, 223. 
Placer gold, 199; mining, 128, 

270-272. 
Platinum, 8, 288. 
Pogrumnoi, Mount, 180. 
Porcupine River, 100, 136. 
Port Wells, 170, 171. 
Potlatch, 22-25. 
Pribilof Islands, 11, 184, 243, 

311, 392, 393. 
Prince of Wales Island, 39, 41, 

279, 285, 288. 
Prince Rupert, 32. 
Prince William Sound, 172, 235, 

278. 
Prybilof, Gerassim, 184, 236, 

310. 
PuUen, Mrs. Harriet, 62-64. 



Q 

Quartz, 201, 272, 277. 
Queen Charlotte Sound, 30. 



Radcliffe Glacier, 172. 

Rampart, 138, 325, 326. 

Rat Islands, 183. 

Ready Bullion Creek, 125. 

Redoubt, Mount, 176. 

Redoubt St. Michael, 97. 

Reed, Frank H., 61. 

Reindeer, 10, 374-378, 395- 

Resurrection BayT240. 

Revillagigedo, 37. 

Richardson, Brigadier-General 

Wilds, 4, 155. 
Rink Rapids, 94. 
Roberts, Mount, 47, 50. 
Rockwell, 48. 
Ross, California, 243. 
Routes of Travel, 15, 16. 
Royal Northwest Mounted 

Police, 87. 
Ruby, 150, 186, 187. 
Rudyerd Bay, 13, 38, 39. 
Russian American Company, 

134, 241, 245. 
Russian Mission, 190. 



St. Elias Island, 231. 

St. Elias, Mount, 238. 

St. Elias Range, 218. 

St. Lawrence Island, 184, 369, 

371- 
St. Matthew Islands, 184. 
St. Michael, 115, 191, 192. 
Salchaket, 157. 
Salmon, 293-300. 
Salmon hatcheries, 299. 
Sandwich Islands, 185, 241. 
Sanford, Mount, 164. 
San Jacinto, Mount, 236. 
School of Mines, 289, 292. 
Seals, 310-313, 392. 
Sea otter, 234, 308-310. 
Seattle, 15, 17, 54, 115, 182, 

185, 323, 396. 
Service, Robert, 102, 103. 
Seward, 12, 15, 172, 280, 345. , 
Seward, Fort William Henry, 54. 
Seward Peninsula, 185, 199, 200, 

206, 269, 283, 284, 288, 359, 

395- 
Seward, William H., i, 246, 333, 

345- 
Shageluk Slough, 190. 
Shakes House, chief, 41. 
Sheep Mountains, 160. 
Sheldon Jackson School, 223, 

224. 
Sheldon, 359. 
Shelikof, Grigor, 235, 236, 238, 

239. 364- 
Shipbuilding, 240, 241, 346. 
Ship Island, 180. 
Shishaldin, Mount, 180. 
Shumagin Islands, 232. 
Siberia, 182, 228, 322, 396-400. 
Silver, 8, 88, 210. 
Silver Row Basin, 50. 
Sitka, 2, 6, 12, 49, 52, 218, 220- 

228, 241, 243, 244, 246, 322, 

325- 366. 
Sixtymile, 100. 
Skagway, 15, 54-62, 64, 116, 

300, 396. 
Sledge Island, 193, 195. 
Smith Glacier, 172. 
Smith, Soapy, 59-62. 
Snake River, 194, 195, 199. 
Solomon, 199. 
Spanish Explorations, 37, 236, 

237- 



.:i^ii>n 



428 



Index 



Spencer Glacier, 347. 

Stanley Park, 20. 

Stefansson, ViUijalmur, 206, 

211,395- 
Steller, George Wilhelm, 229, 

231, 232. 
Stewart River, 99, 100, 112. 
Stick Indians, 97. 
Stikine River, 40, 41, 92, 115. 
Stuck, Hudson, 351, 355. 
Sulphur, 182. 
Summit Lake, 68. 
Sumner, Charles, 246, 333, 419. 
Surprise Lake, 79. 



Taku Glacier, 46. 

Taku Inlet, 46, 52. 

Taku River, 47, 52. 

Tanana, 12, 139, 140. 

Tanana River, 140, 141, 156, 

157, 160, 287. 
Tanana Valley, 150, 331. 
Tantalus Bluff, 93. 
Teller, 199, 200. 
Tenderfoot Creek, 159. 
Teslin, Lake, 40, 115. 
Teslin River, 92. 
Thane, 47. 

Thirtymile River, 92, 97, 1 19. 
Timber, 10, 254-256, 394, 395. 
Tin, 8, 9, 201, 283-285, 391. 
Tolovana, 142. 
Tougas National Forest, 255. 
Totem poles, 25-28, 39, 40. 
Treadwell Mines, 7, 47, 48, 

273-276. 
Trout, 306. 
Tungsten, 8, 289. 
Tumagain Arm, 238, 347, 348. 



U 

Unalaklik, 189, 193. 

Unalaska, 12, 180-183, 243, 367, 

397- 
Unimak Island, 180-183. 
Unimak Pass, 184, 397. 
Upper Ramparts of ^Yukon, 

99- 



V 

Valdez, 12, 115, 132, 152, 155, 
169, 170, 172, 278, 337. 

Vancouver, 19, 20. 

Vancouver, George, 19, 37, 53, 
237, 238, 352. 

Vancouver Island, 18, 19. 

Vassar Glacier, 172. 

Veniaminof, Father Innocen- 
tius, 180, 365, 366. 

Victoria, 18, 19. 

Victoria Rock, 99. 

W 

Walrus, 304. 

Watson River, 84. 

Wellesley Glacier, 172. 

Western Union Telegraph Ex- 
pedition, 189. 

Whales, 303, 304. 

White Horse, 88, 97. 

White Horse Rapids, 85, 88, 
119. 

White Pass, 56, 57, 65-68, 115, 
117. 

White Pass and Yukon Route, 
64. 

White Pass City, 64, 66. 

White River, 54, 99, 279. 

Wild berries, 252, 253. 

Wild flowers, 249-252. 

Wild vegetables, 253-254. 

Windy Arm, 119. 

Wrangell, 40, 92, 366, 396. 

Wrangell, Baron, 40, 244. 

Wrangell, Mount, 164, 165. 

Wrangell Narrows, 43. 



Yakataga, 286, 287. 
Yale Glacier, 172. 
York Mountains, 284. 
Yukon Crossing, 95. 
Yukon Flats, 135. 
Yukon Ramparts, 139. 
Yukon River, 4, 68, 88-100, 
119, 129-141, 186-192, 287. 



Zagoskin, Lieutenant, 187. 



A^ 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process 
Neutralizing Agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: m n-r- .,» ^ _ 

1998 




BBKKEEPEt^ 



PRESbHVATION TECHNOLOGIES, Lp" 
^ . Ill Thomson Park Drive 

W\ ^, Cranberry Township, PA 1 6066 
\ -' (724)779-2111 



